Microsoft and Steam represent the big dogs in just one of the entertainment industries. The others are mobile, broadcast, film, and audio. The latter three have found ways to limit consumer flexibility in order to increase profits and are constantly striving to boost profitability (holding satellite and cable companies for ransom every time contracts are renewed, delaying release to DVD rental outfits like Netflix to increase theater and DVD purchase revenues, renaming property theft as "piracy" which originally was a violent capital crime, region codes, getting the FBI on their side, etc. for example). Mobile app providers have stores that enforce locking apps to a device-user combination (though some allow multiple devices per account). It is only logical the game industry would like a similar regime of restrictions and take them as far as the market and government judicial/legislative entities will allow. Consoles offer a different feature/restriction mix than PCs but I think they'll eventually die out in favor of more generic devices like tablet-laptop hybrids that offer flexibility in game sources. Microsoft knows this and are testing waters with on-line service delivery a la Office 2013. But they'll stave it off for games as long as they can do so profitably while they build their distribution prowess sufficiently to take on Steam. When you join a market, you submit to the lowest common denominator of consumer demand in terms of price and features. Don't like it? Don't join the market. You have a choice.

My daily drive is beyond the range of electrics and the break even for a hybrid in my area is 5 years over a fuel-efficient gasoline auto. It''s simply not a rational choice.

Why should I spend extra money with no benefit to me? You like those expensive hybrids, by two, one for me. I will make rational economic decisions in my self-interest.

You may not like all the subsidies given to fossil fuel companies but you and the rest of us consume fossil fuels to drive our vehicles and, until we stop that choice, it makes sense to subsidize the companies providing the energy product most Americans prefer to use.

"I thought we'd been talking about that for years (especially around the time of the Olympics) and haven't stopped."

Talking isn't Doing. Only a Gen-Xer or newer would think: "Hey, I got it done—I Tweeted it! I shared it on Facebook!. For the win!". Not hardly. Those crusty Baby Boomers would like you to know: Accomplished in Cyberspace != Accomplished Physically in the Real World i.e For Real. Sheesh.

Where ever an empire puts its assets, its adversaries will seek to capture, control, or disable them.That has been a standard strategy since before the Romans as any student of history would know. Why this is news is a good question since it should have been obvious from the beginning. Any of you folks ever read Sun Tzu? Sheesh. You sound like the "let's ban assault rifles" nannies when 3 to 1 pistols were used in mass shootings and only 323 people where killed with rifles in 2011 while 700+ were killed with fists and 1,700 were killed with knives while over 6,200 were killed with pistols which you'll never ban.

I dunno... What excuse do we have for doing this over Iraqi or Afghani citizenry and with live rounds? The same potential one: fighting insurgents, invaders, criminal gangs, terrorists. You train for the battle you intend to fight. Who those adversaries will be is left as exercise for the reader.

Absolutely right. Even if their leaders can be bought, their people eventually rebel against the selfish leaders.

If they destroy the keys, IPs, and URLs used to access hosted data but not hosted data, it would prevent easy access. People can be tortured to give up information so they had cyanide teeth to bite on but devices are easy—just use them even if you have to break into their security—in time you can. So maybe this is the equivalent of a cyanide tooth for access electronics.

Since all batteries in an airplane application need charging and monitoring circuits and those circuits are likely to fail from time to time, batteries that start fires when circuits fail are indeed part of the fault equation. Pushing off the blame onto just the batteries is most likely a PR strategy of Boeing's. If the circuit is essentially part of the battery without which the battery could not function, then the blame lies with the designers who used it: Boeing, not the battery manufacturer. This PR seems to me a "spin-control" by japan and their battery industry to limit the PR damage to the battery manufacturer because it is clear now that Boeing is going to layoff blame for their poor design on the battery manufacturers. The fact is these batteries should never be used in any place where their failure will have catastrophic consequences. But that was a decision Boeing engineers made, not the battery manufacturers. Let's keep the focus on the firm that designed the airplane and certainly conducted studies regarding the consequences of the failure of monitoring and charging circuitry on batteries and physical airplane integrity. I sense a Ford Pinto gas tank human cost trade-off calculus moment of truth coming. Wait for it.