The child poster who first replied to your comment was not me, the parent poster.

To expand upon my original comment: I am not interested in paying for and using software that is tied to platforms and services that I do not want or need. In my opinion, Origin is a good example of such a platform for two reasons. The first is that it is a glorified game-launcher application. If I've purchased a physical copy of the game, I should not need to install and use Origin to simply run the game, especially if its integration with Origin is minimal. Secondly, Origin is a digital storefront dedicated solely to a small catalog of EA products.

In contrast, I find platforms like Steam to be useful. For the most part, I'm able to launch and play games outside of the Steam service. As well, Steam offers a broad selection of products from a number of publishers. The fact that they offer massive sales throughout the year is also appealing, though tangential to the discussion.

Since EA has refused to release any of its newer games on Steam or other distribution platforms, there four options: (i) don't play the game, (ii) pirate the game and use a crack to get around the Origin requirement, (iii) pay for the game and crack it to get around the Origin requirement, or (iv) pay for the game and install/use Origin. Option (iv) is unappealing, as I do not wish to use Origin. Option (iii) is the one with the best intent; however, it is an unlawful choice due to circumventing the application protections. Moreover, in giving money to EA, I am reinforcing their use of Origin. Option (ii) is also unlawful. In this case, there are three possible side effects: (i) EA starts more tightly integrating their games with Origin, making cracking much more difficult or impossible, (ii) EA stops targeting computer gamers, or (iii) EA opens up their catalog to compensate for lost sales. This last side effect, while appealing, is unlikely.

Since EA started bundling their games with Origin, I have consistently chosen option (i) and will continue to do so in the future. If I had an overwhelming desire to play the game, which is not likely to happen, I would either go with option (ii) or an altered version of option (iii). I don't disagree with your assertion that this is an entitled viewpoint. However, it is not one on which I have acted.

I think you might want to revisit what a corporation is. It's a legal construct designed to shield individuals from losing everything if their business goes belly-up.

As for your idea that a corporation is exactly the same thing as a political party... well, it certainly explains the cluster fuck in this country. Congratulations, you ARE the root problem.

I'm wondering: is your car a 1960 VW Beetle or 2CV? Because those are the only cars I can think of where the seats can sag enough to make this a worthwhile proposition.

Or, much more likely, you actually don't do any of this.

A little hint: "GottMitUns" is German and translates to "GodWithUs". Which just so happens to be the motto of the German military army (and a few other groups) until the end of WW2. Generally, it's fairly safe to assume that someone still sporting that motto has some serious hang-ups with German military and groups from 1900s to 1945.

Congratulations, CaptainLard gets it. Sycodon doesn't. I'll make another sweeping generalization: "conservatives can't read". This is fun! I can do this all day.

Do I also get to make sweeping generalizations about conservatives because you don't like government interference except to:
- control what I do in my bedroom
- control my social life
- control what I talk about
- control who I do business with
- control where I go
- control what I believe
- control what business I'm allowed to engage in

Just asking whether the "idiots are everywhere" and "generalizations are fun" rules can be abused in the other direction as well.

Actually, Congress did give NOAA more money for a new supercomputer. The computer hasn't materialized because NOAA is locked into a single-source contract with IBM. As TFA mentions, IBM just sold its supercomputer division to a Chinese company (Lenovo). It seems some people are antsy about the implications for a Chinese company providing the computer behind a critical national security capability (weather prediction).

Spot on. Every single failure I've seen of an internal communications tool that wasn't Email or IM failed because of a lack of one of the three things you mentioned. They are tools, but they need to much more help to grow than something that everyone has to use, like a case system or a CRM.

I worked in the past at a company that did something similar to a "Facebook at work". The number one rule to get people to use it: never, EVER call it "Facebook for work". Call it "Shining Communications Turd", "Chainsaw through productivity", "Free Crack", just don't call it "Facebook for work".

I think Facebook might have a bigger uphill battle here than it thinks.

Where did you work, the NSA?

True, but how is that any different to the normal situation where the maximum amount is £20?

Arguably it could make the attack more worthwhile. The effort and hit rate involved might not make it worthwhile at low ticket amount (might as well have a real job) but could be worthwhile as the money starts going up.

Realistically though it sounds like the attacker needs a merchant account to benefit (and presumably enough legitimate volume to hide the fraudulent transactions in without raising suspicions). From the sounds of it the biggest problem would occur if you were actually overseas and you were using your card in cafes and the like. Then perhaps an unscrupulous vendor might be able to get close enough to charge your card without you noticing and you might not notice it as fraudulent when you got your statement.

Erm, what? I know how PageRank works because I read about it as a technical paper in a Computing Journal in 1998, before Google was started as a company. That said, I don't know what came first - the paper or the patent. Pretty sure though that the paper came first, or was at least simultaneous to the patent filing. Finally, most of the stuff in the Google ranking mechanism is as much an algorithm as a kernel is an algorithm. It's a host of ranking modules, tweaks, weights, heuristics, clean-up jobs, maintenance jobs, spider jobs, and a whole crap-load of IT work to make it hum like it does.

Please do enlighten us how it could easily apply algorithms to categorize data to distinguish between personal, protected data, and data of public records that belong to someone else. Just for shits and grins, please create an algorithm that would distinguish between the Washington Post article and the original bankruptcy article.

Wow. So that means that now laws that cannot be followed every time are a good idea? In the case of Google, it means a perpetual fine that cannot be escaped, is completely arbitrary, and applies only to Google.

Everything you posted so far is a damning indictment of exactly why this law is terrible: it's not possible to fully comply, it's arbitrary, it's open to abuse from all sides, and its target is also completely arbitrary.

Technically, you are accurate in your description of why Google needs to follow the law as it is written. However, the discussion we're having is about whether the law should exist in the first law. On that, you're digging your own hole.

Considering the over-reaction we're getting from a lot of people around Ebola - and that includes people who laugh about bureaucrats' overreaction to blinking lights in Chicago and WiFi network names - I'm going to guess that most people are just scared shitless of stuff they don't understand and willing to sacrifice everything to feel safe again.

That doesn't make it any better, but it gives us a better shot at fixing the issue (educate people) than the conspiracy theory approach.

As others have pointed out, the Peace Prize is inherently political in nature. What should be emphasized is that it's also given out by an entirely different committee, in a different country.

Peace Prize: Norwegian Nobel Committee
Physics and Chemistry Prizes: Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences
Physiology or Medicine: Nobel Assembly at Karolinska Institutet (Sweden)
Literature: Swedish Academy

Economics (not really a Nobel): Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences