If it makes anyone other than those willing participants in the ongoing Security Theater debacle feel better then you can label it an unintended consequence.

Why would a TV manufacturer include this? What would the business model be? "Buy our ACME TV, it has real spy ware with a standardized interface that any ISP can use!"

"Verizon Patents Eavesdropping Using Your TV For Ad Targeting"

It's not my TV or even yours in which it's installed, it's in the set-top box that decodes the signal and responds to the remote. I'll bet that if it's ever deployed DHS will have a back door.

"People just don't get it. The US government does not need to cut its budget by 3%. It needs to cut its budget by 50% or more."

We are in a recession/depression. Hundreds of thousands have lost jobs, lost their homes, lost businesses, their children their hopes of college, etc. In this financial state we are cutting down on government spending, thus causing thousands to loose jobs directly and suppliers to fire workers. It's been working so well that (snicker) that many want it expanded. This will result in more foreclosures, etc. But don't worry this is the road to prosperity; Greece and Spain, for instance, have had fiscal austerity forced on them and are watching their economy spiral down the drain. We should follow this model?

Governments role is to try to preserve jobs during fiscal downturns; if cutting government spending is needed it should be done in good times when the effects of this economic poison is diluted.

I work for a US Federal Agency and our notebooks were all encrypted about two years ago. I know that some problems arose from that but in my major problem is that it takes 10 or, more often, 15 minutes from boot to have a usable machine! We will soon need to insert a "LinkPass" card in our machines to be able to use them (we have had the passes for a few years), we must wear the cards in the facility, and they will be used to unlock exterior doors, too. It's going to be difficult to remember to take the card out when one leaves the vicinity of the office/cubical.

Informally, yes, but not formally: "Sure he is guilty, his brother is in prison for murder". And on and on.

This shouldn't fly. Christians, and perhaps Jews, have believed in original sin in which guilt has been transferred from Eve for millennia. They published but didn't file for a patent.

I did my first coding at 37 on using punch cards and coded for cash the next year. A couple of years ago I had to switch from C/C++ and Windows to Java on LINUX and have learned Java and some LINUX. When my Raspberry Pi arrives in a couple of weeks I'll start on Python! Mostly my job descriptions have been Ecologist with some coding. I look at most of the coding I've done as problem/puzzle solving.

Bangladesh, Pakistan, Sudan, Columbia, Burma, Cambodia, or perhaps Uruguay?

Is the 600 barrels a measure of volume, 42 gallons to a barrel? Did it mean 600 drums of unknown capacity, perhaps 55 gallon drums? But it's a Canadian story and wouldn't they use metric? Perhaps the barrels are made of maple wood, charred inside and used for aging the syrup, eh?

Try this alternative. Join the military, shoot a lot different weapons, work in very loud enclosed spaces, don't use effective ear protection (there was none). That's what I did; consequently I don't hear a lot of street noises and what's there is kinda covered up by the constant ringing in my ears. At least I wasn't shot and didn't get malaria so I'm not complaining.

Crank up the sound level on your stereo to really high levels and use it constantly to mask street noises. Magically, after a while, you won't need it any more.

I agree, it's clear in retrospect.

I can't wait for my virtual underwater trip down the Mississippi with this technology! :-)

I had thought that the next "street-view" would be of popular and exotic hiking trails. I guess that's harder to pull off.