If step 1 is Learn the language then step 2 is Learn the idioms.
Get a copy of Effective Java, read it, understand it and you will be half way there.

People will not buy them again in an even higher quality. Barely anyone cares about quality anymore - they listen to compressed music on a poor format (mp3) on a portable device using low-fi earbuds.

If quality is such a big argument - why isn't blu-ray doing better than it is?

100% agree with this. You can't get HD without Sky+.

Do what I did - write to James Murdoch. That got things moving.

If that doesn't work - write to his Dad.

I think a lot of Sky subscribers would prefer them to fix the issues with existing HD boxes first

1. Freezing an HD picture can crash the box
2. Timing issues with cutoff of program ends
3. IR interference on some boxes.

and many many more

Whoops. Just read the last line of the article. Someone did claim it causes Cancer.
 

The Daily Mail is on a mission to separate all known substances into those that may cause Cancer and those that do.

So they are now trying it on with other stuff as well. I'm surprised that they didn't claim it causes Cancer and Birth Defects as well.

Err... Scala uses the JVM. So the performance in Scala and Java would be roughly the same.

My wife worked in the IT dept of a large UK school with (1600+) pupils until recently. Their biggest problem is getting good staff who know their way around systems.

The money available to hire good staff is pitiful and you won't be swamped with good IT people wanting to earn 10-15000 quid.

In addition, students try and break things as much as possible. Use cheap commodity kit and be prepared to switch it out at a moments notice.

Also be prepared for the 50% of teachers who can't (or won't) get used to technology.

Enlist the local councils IT dept for firewalls, virus checkers, p0rn filters etc.

Setup a policy to stop ALL use of USBs and reading from external devices. If you don't you will have a multitude of viruses and trojans on day one.