I can see why Firefox was created, and I used it quite happily for years. But when it kept memory-leaking worse and worse with every release, I had to let it go. (My job necessarily involves a LOT of web browsing and tabs... and no, I don't work for a porn site.) Chrome does what I need it to, never locks the HDD light on with swap activity, and I cannot remember the last time it crashed. It's fast, and has all the function I require.

GMail. I have essentially infinite storage, access on every internet device in the world, a nearly-perfect spam filter, a great search engine (which is necessary as I do not use folders), and it's fast.

I know what Google "charges" for Chrome and GMail (privacy) and it's a price I'm willing to pay for two products that have made my life much easier.

The IEEE-SA rules are legally binding, so with standards subject to the new rule, such an injunction would be relatively easy to fight off.

The DoJ was involved to make sure the IEEE-SA was not engaging in conduct that would fall afoul of anti-trust law. They don't personally have any dog in the patent fight; they are just making sure the IEEE was not trying to discourage competition by new market entrants by working out rules designed by current competitors.

In case anybody was wondering why the DoJ was involved, it was most likely to ensure that the IEEE's rules passed anti-trust muster. A bunch of erstwhile competitors gathering together and deciding jointly on restraints on their conduct (and the conduct of future competitors) is subject to heightened scrutiny to make sure that the rules are not written to discourage new market entrants.

Oh, you are right, jury nullification is no more or less than the statement that a jury can acquit a defendant for any reason they damn well please and there's nothing to stop them; this is obvious to anybody that ever paid a lick of attention in 8th-grade civics class. I would hope it would only be used to refuse to convict under illegal laws, because otherwise it turns the concept of us being a nation of laws, and not men, on it's head. If a prosecution produces an unpleasant result under the law, but the prosecution is still legal, there are means (however imperfect) for the law to be changed. The jury deciding on their own that they like the defendant too much for his/her sentence is not how the law is supposed to work.

And not that your other points have anything to do with nullification, but...

The "see no evil" defense is pretty weak sauce against these money-laundering related charges. (And certainly they will get you civilly fined to kingdom come.) The idea that DPR/Ulbricht did NOT know the primary use of his market was the illegal drug trade is ludicrous in the extreme; it does not take any great leap of logic to discard such an assertion utterly.

And no, pre-paid providers do NOT benefit from burner phones. Such phones are usually subsidized at retail (plus there are real costs involved with activation) and when they are quickly discarded after a short period of time, so the provider takes it in the proverbial shorts. (But what do cell phone providers have to do with the proverbial price of tea in China? Not sure what you are getting at there.)

And, given that the police don't even need to file charges to perform civil forfeiture (I certainly usually don't agree with that practice), arguing that that was their motive for prosecuting him is also pretty silly. (However, in this case, civil forfeiture actually makes sense since nobody ever laid official claim to Silk Road's Bitcoins.)

The prosecutors objected to everything (and the judge allowed) because the defense wanted to cross-examine prosecution witnesses on topics the prosecution had not brought up on direct examination.

The proper thing to do when you want to bring up new topics with prosecution witnesses is to also list them as witnesses for the defense, not lay out your defense case before it's your turn to do so.

And the defense tried to insert their experts at the last minute without presenting sufficient evidence that they were experts. Again, this is not an obscure corner of trial procedure. If you want to introduce expert witnesses at the last minute (and it's certainly permissible to do so), you better make damn sure all your ducks are in a row on demonstrating their expertise.

The idea that it should be illegal to knowingly profit from transactions of highly illegal products is not exactly an obscure or particularly controversial area of jurisprudence, nor it it an example of overly-broad vaguely-worded laws, like, say, CFAA prosecutions.

And jury nullification is supposed to be for juries to nullify illegal laws (i.e. unconstitutional ones), not laws they might have a personal disagreement with.

When this weak sauce is all you can come up with for a defense, why, oh why, would you not plead out?

"I made the site, but I left (but came back just in time for the FBI to catch me.)" Yeah, that's really going to sway a jury.

The Snowden revelations about constitutionally-questionable domestic spying have been with the full co-operation of telecom and internet companies, hence no super-smart mathematicians necessary, just a bunch of IT guys and CompSci specialists to deal with the large amount of data.

NSA's "traditional" activities, which involve espionage and codebreaking applied against foreign powers (requiring the aid of mathematicians for codebreaking) is an accepted and normal part of international relations, in a tradition going back millenia. Yes, when spies or espionage projects are caught there's usually a stern press release, but nothing ever comes of it.

China can ask for the source, but I don't see any US firm agreeing. They certainly wouldn't care about China-only builds having back-doors; that I'm sure they'd agree to. But giving up the source? No way. If they do that, they know that the code will quickly be incorporated into products from Chinese companies and their sales will drop soon afterwards as the thieves sell their own versions for far less.

If service call costs for one or two disks are prohibited, simply put in enough spares so you only have to roll a tech for, say, 10 drives.

Alternatively, make them user-swappable. If all the customer has to do is ask their tech to yank drives with a Blinky Amber Light of Doom, even the most untrained monkey could figure that out.

Unlimited WiFi data within their local service area is not really that big of a deal, given the wide availability of free WiFi already. And you can already get worldwide free "phone service" (through WiFi) through any number of providers.

Most ISP's (and some cell carriers) offer unlimited data on their own WiFi network already. That's not really a very big feature.

There's no sign they are including a single byte of cellular data here.

I'm pretty sure they are doing it this way because they don't want to talk Joe Public through the process of replacing whatever dialer they have with the one they'll need for the app.

$30/mo is a terrible price. If all you want is talk/text, you can get that, on an ACTUAL cellular network (Cricket/AT&T, and I'm sure other providers) for $25/mo. And, to top it off, they'll only charge you $25 for that Moto G, instead of $100.

As a $5 add-on to your cable plan, it's pretty nice... but not at the "rack" rate.

The most common mouse failure is the microswitches. Most mice use the exact same switch... Ten minutes, a cheap pencil iron, desolder wick, and some solder, and you are good to go for another few years.

I've been nursing along an original Trackman Marble for twenty years this way.