Just wanted to point out that besides modern Greek, ancient Greek is also being taught in Greek high schools. It was mandatory some years ago and I expect it still is. I've also heard that ancient Greek is a popular course in certain countries like France, but I can't tell if it is true or not.

Did I say that companies are bad and that we need to go pre-industrial? I only said that lowering taxes doesn't always work the way you think.

Based on what I have read, I understand that GM hasn't been paying taxes and has downsized its personnel. Moving corporate headquarters or hiring more people wouldn't have increased their taxes anyway since that wouldn't have affected their profits (at least upwards). Moving part of their production to the US wouldn't be a problem either because their creative accounting would make sure that any profits would show up in some other country. The reason they are not investing in the US is because both manpower and materials are cheaper elsewhere. Eliminating taxes for them is not an incentive to do anything since they are not bothered by taxes anyway. Granted that such a thing would help smaller corporations that are not that "flexible". Of course lowering income tax would also help most of these corporations as well, since they are targeted to the domestic market.

It is also sad that some people think that the theory of Economics they read in textbooks works as advertised in an international environment.

Unfortunately I don't see how the "tax breaks" to GM and others have improved the unemployment situation in the US or the US economy. What I see (and I could be wrong) is that the money that they save is invested elsewhere, where it is more profitable. They do invest in lobbying, but I doubt that trickles down to the rest of us.

"Unfair competition laws" == Laws against unfair competition.

The problem here is that GM is not competing with Microsoft.

The navigation is covert. It is looking to minimize the chances of being spotted by (presumably) looking for shadows, going under tables, avoiding people and whatnot. Mapping is not even mentioned in the system's factsheet.

Personally I doubt that someone would be actively looking for lasers or have laser detection systems installed in a combat, hostage or other similar situation. In any case vision-based mapping is also possible, so I guess they either wanted to minimize processing requirements or it was just easier and faster to get a product out. When they start selling it, it will probably come with different payloads EO/IR, laser scanner, chemical sniffers, etc.

Btw Kinect (which someone suggested as an alternative) would have the same issue.

42 hours a week and 29 days vacation for me and I am in the civil service sector.

So how long until it cools enough to get a fourth dimension and will we ever get to 11?

In Germany there are four choices and as far as I know you need to get a two year contract, so good luck if you feel like switching. Personally I found them to be expensive. Of course you can always go prepaid as I did. In Greece there are only three choices, but last time I was there I was able to get a contract with no fixed duration (and no termination fees), cheap roaming within Europe and a discount in the already low monthly fees because I had a phone. The number of choices (as long as there is choice) does not count so much as having real competition.

True, that's mostly a human trait.

I can too. The whole episode. No commercials (more joy). Have tried in Germany (and Greece of all places) without proxy or other tricks.

I believe that at first there will be some apprehension and it won't be as easy as you describe. Nevertheless, after the second year when the number of arrests based on the identity/tracking chip increases from 73.053 to 127.314 (including 23 violent/dangerous offenders) the public confidence will rise, countering initial bad coverage and concerns about the cost and privacy issues.

I use it to change keyboard layouts, other people use it as a backspace or escape. Some applications use it for changing between different modes. In any case, who cares if they remove it? Quality of comments will not improve, even for those who will post using Google Chrome Notebook.

Why is everyone assuming that the "colonists" will die within days of arrival? I am willing to bet that there will be lots of volunteers for one-way missions to Mars (provided good chances of survival).

So most people don't mind sharing personal information with these "friends", but when it comes to sharing their email is where they draw the line? I would think it would be the reverse. Many people have my email address, very few of them know who I am dating or what I did last night.