I have both, and the Kindle has an easy of use about it that more flexible Nook cannot match.

Easy of use can be much more important than most geeks think.

No, the year of the Linux desktop is over.

We used to have Gnome 2, KDE 2 and 3, OpenOffice, Mozilla, Flash Player and many useful tools against Windows XP. It was superior technology, but the impact was limited (LiMuX?).

OpenOffice is in ruins (and hardly better than 10 years ago), the Gnome community is split, and KDE keeps getting fatter. Meanwhile Windows 7 is a half decent operating system, and Office 2007 has upped the game considerably. Even Google targets Linux only for some of their products.

The battle for the desktop is over and lost.

Apple ][e is what you need - with a CPM card.

Yes, it is the Amazon store integration that makes the Kindle so great. Buying a book and reading it is a very seamless experience, no matter how you buy it.

The Nook is much more flexible, but also much more complicated to use. And once it is rooted, it gets worse (plus you are stuck on an absolutely ancient version of Android). There is a lot of potential in the Nook, but it is just not quite there yet.

I completely agree. W3C seems to be always behind reality, trying to describe it, but not define it. IETF did a lot of very useful work, but they have been branching out into rather obscure protocols recently. Where is HTTP/1.2? Surely HTTP/1.1 is not perfect?

And Google did what Google does: they threw together a prototype and checked how it would work. And it seems it is working very well for them, but maybe not so much for others.

I would also advocate to separate some of the concerns. Transmitting huge amount of bulk data is a problem that is (mostly) solved with HTTP/1.1. Encryption less so, session tracking is a bit of a pain, and server push is really ugly in HTTP/1.1.

PS: Concerning the original submission, there is nothing wrong with encrypting cookies. Instead it is the proper thing to do if you do not trust the client, which you should never do.

I did not matter one bit when XP was released, it matters when a better alternative was available. Windows 7 is not even 5 years old, and 4 years ago Windows XP was still being sold with new netbooks. Those machines do not even run Windows 7 properly unless you upgrade the RAM.

> we don't bar people based on race or nationality alone.

You don't? That does not align with my experience. How about Syria or Cuba?

Actually Bing is not bad. For many general queries it is just as good as Google. Just with those very specific ones it seems to struggle a bit more than Google.

The main reason I do not use Bing is that it is just one step away from that ghastly portal called MSN. I neither need reactionary news nor the latest celebrity gossip...

ITER's funding is a massively political issue. I would argue that it is funded exactly because it is expensive. My scientists involved in fusion research work in, on or with ITER - do you really think they would give good marks to a simple fusion technology in a peer review?

I am not saying that what they propose is sound - not even the proposal does that. But I would say that the fact that they cannot get traditional funding does not go against them.

Remember cold fusion? It certainly works, but it does not scale. We could have tried to make it scale, but nobody was really interested. ITER on the other hand has a clear route to market, but it will cost somewhere in the region of 100 billion to do so.

> A spreadsheet doesn't _easily_ have forms with validation and reporting.

Funny, my Excel has exactly that in the data tab. No macro required, just a few choices in the dialog.

The main downside of Excel over a real database is performance, but if that is not an issue, go for it.

Agreed. Even as a drive user, I always found it a bit weird that drive contained an editor for office files. A viewer - fine, that could be useful, but an editor? The division into a separate app makes a lot more sense. And I if there are hand over issues, I am sure they can be sorted out quickly.

Better not let them play any ball games either, just to be sure. And no contact sports either.

> That, and that originally Linux had a semi-fascist leader in Linus Torvalds.

I am sure he prefers the term benevolent dictator. And I have to say in his favor that his leadership style has evolved noticeable over time, and that is probably what saved Linux.

The advantage of one person being in charge is of course that you get consistent leadership style, and a consistent technical direction. That often helps with open source projects - and it can be the very downfall of commercial software.

OpenOffice is an excellent example of what happens if there is no clear vision. It was elegant and reasonably simple, but not exactly pretty. Now it is neither.

> Instead they allow themselves to be satisfied with the bread and circuses that are so freely handed to them.

Funny, because I thought those cost money. Now in countries with a generous benefit systems, you get lodging, food and cable TV included in your benefits...

> And the amount of "battery research" that resulted in nothing, where we were told they'd be the next big thing in 5-10 years time? Innumerable.

Welcome to research. Many research projects, even really successful ones, just end up with a gain of knowledge, but no commercial value. Research projects that actually change the world are few and far in between. That's why it is called research, and not development.

Just read the history of Lithium batteries. Most of the big steps were made at universities in research projects: the use of Lithium, the intercalation, the reversible chemistry, improved electrolytes, chemistries etc. Some steps came from commercial laboratories. All major improvements were the result of research projects.