Even a complete failure of all iPads in the cockpit (however unlikely that is) will probably not be a big deal. You're forgetting that the crew still has radio contact with air traffic control and their company. They can still get vectored where they need to be and have whatever information they need read to them. There multiple thing that are far more likely that an obscure bug affecting multiple iPads simultaneously.

$1000 per helicopter is more than nothing. But it's not just a money thing. You're also overlooking the time and paperwork to install it, plus any FAA paperwork (and time required for it) for certification in their operation. Once they have it, fixing/replacing it in the future requires all the hoops of a certified system. For that trouble they get a crappy, out of date product.

He's looking for an alternative. There may not be a simple one out there. But if he happens to find one that meets his criteria, odds are it will not only be cheaper, but much better. It's also quite possible that it will ultimately require less time and hassle than the certified system. Depending on what's out there, he could come away with substantial savings of money AND time, while equipping his fleet with a superior product. It's at least worth looking into.

Do you happen to have any links handy to document that? I've heard this claim before and if true it's quite telling and i'd like to know more. But I haven't seen anything more than a claim that it happened with judges somewhere in Florida.

Google "goatse" and you'll find a picture that shows where they pulled the numbers from.

Some one want to explain to me why we're supposed to care about this?

So... to avoid a situation that "will invoke a whole host of legal, territorial, and logistical questions, based on who has sovereignty at what point, as well as cost a lot of money", we now have him holed up in an embassy of a country that's granting him asylum, with the host country threatening to revoke diplomatic privileges in what may or may not be a treaty violation with far reaching implications on the sovereignty of embassies worldwide. While their lawyers figure out whether that's legal, the police are surrounding the building to make sure he doesn't get out and to keep the protesters at bay. Until they figure out an answer, diplomats on all sides are rattling their sabers vying for the upper hand. Meanwhile there's talk of whether it's legal to smuggle him out in a diplomatic bag as a way of crossing the British sidewalk that stands between the foreign soil of the embassy and its sovereign embassy car. All this coming after months of legal proceedings and requests between countries.

If Sweden's goal in not questioning him abroad was to avoid complication and expense, it seems like they failed miserably.

I'm all for having him interviewed and charged if there were crimes committed, but surely provoking an international incident isn't the most effective way to do that.

How thoughtful of India to create all those jobs for Chinese children.

Perhaps. But that reveals the underlying flaw in the do no track (DNT) idea (even if companies want to honor it): It doesn't work if everyone opts not to be tracked. There's just too much perceived value from tracking users. When it's less than 1% of the total users asking not to be tracked, marketers don't really lose anything by honoring the system. But setting IE 10 to use DNT by default means 95+% of IE 10 users will be using DNT. That's a huge market share gone,

And maybe more importantly, DNT becomes no longer opt-in. It's now an opt out system for nearly half of the users. That adds a pretty powerful argument to ignore the opt out request: nearly all of the users didn't really choose to opt-out of tracking, they just selected the default setting. So tracking them doesn't really violate their wishes. Out of 20 people who say "don't track me", maybe one actually means it. If you're a web company, even with the best of intentions, it's hard to give up tracking 20 people just to honor the wishes of one.

(This post brought to you by a six pack of Sierra Nevada Pale Ale.)

Well now you've got a way to blackmail them back. If they force you to 'like' their page, just hop over and post a comment describing how their product is the perfect way to give people the energy needed to oppress minorities (or whatever it is that will get them in trouble). Then file a complaint with the appropriate government agency. Be sure to send a note to the company letting them know that you'll stop if they stop.

That's exactly what I thought when i read it. It's like he's making this into a joke. If they use these sorts of policies and ever end up defending against a harassment suit, it's not going to end well. The accuser is going to be on the stand testifying about all the harassment she suffered "...and then i complained to my manager, and all he did was make the offender wear a pink polka tie. Everybody got a big laugh out of that, like this was all a big joke to them." Any halfway decent lawyer is going to make that look like he was encouraging it, He's gonna get crucified.

I get that the guy asking is trying not to make a huge thing out of this so he can avoid destroying what i guess he thinks is a good work environment among the team, but he's clearly in over his head on this one.

This is very confusing. I wish someone would just make a plot of horniness versus day of the year so we could see whether there was a spike around Ramadan. This is slashdot, surely there's enough horny geeks to be able to pull this off. And now that i've mentioned it, i wonder if there's some way to objectively measure horniness?