I'm still watering my veggies with a sprinkler, for the most part. I check my soil's moisture with my finger, and I calculate how much water has been put down using either a couple tin cans or some cheapie rain gauges.

I guess this new equipment is now going to be added to the list of things I'm not using. On the bright side, it also means some hacker isn't going to turn my vegetable garden into a bog garden from the comfort of their parents' basement... they'll have to sneak into my yard and turn on the faucet by hand (and hope they make it past the dogs and the homeowner).
 

So Google+ has apparently taken off! I must have missed the memo!

Well, I suppose if the frame of reference was Orkut, then yes it has. Sure, Google+ has tens of millions of members... who aren't actually aware they are members of Google+.

Back when I was on Facebook, it seemed like every change they made was designed to make me want to use its product less. So much so that I eventually asked them to delete my account.

I've been using Aperture since it first came out.I never liked how Lightroom worked - it certainly has powerful capabilities, but you have to do things exactly the way it wants you to do them. Aperture seemed better at getting out of my way.

If the new Photos app doesn't have all of Aperture's tools, though, I may not have a choice. And, with Aperture gone, I imagine Lightroom will quickly switch to the subscription model Adobe is trying to force down our throats with all their other titles. But I'm going to wait and see what the new app is like before committing, one way or the other. Adobe's "double down on Lightroom" statement can be seen two ways - and one of them is they may be worried about what's coming.

I'm old enough to recall when many people argued we didn't have to worry about various (then theoretical) JPEG vulnerabilities because they would be "extremely hard to exploit". But once it becomes known that something is possible, people have repeatedly proven themselves extremely clever in figuring out how to accomplish it.

If I was on the Rover team, I might not worry - but terrestrial users of LZO compression should at least start thinking about how to ameliorate this.

Yes, it's not as if there's any recent evidence that US governmental entities sometimes obtain information by one method! then pretend they got it a different way.

There was a period in time where pretty much everyone in my group (including the student helpers) would order snacks, daily, from kozmo.com. The problem was they'd order them independently over a span of a few hours. So the delivery guy would have to make multiple trips to our building to deliver a candy bar, then a pint of Ben & Jerrys, then some licorice or a can of pop.

It really isn't a sustainable model when you have to send a guy out just to deliver a Snickers bar.

So my case with the built in rocket launcher is still fair game to them? That sucks!

Sure, but they're unpopular politically.

More likely Dalvik# or Dalvik.net .

Dude, I work at the University of Washington - and I know what our faculty make.

And you don't have to take my word for this. State of Washington employee salaries - this includes UW faculty - are publicly available. Look up the names of some of our CSE or EE faculty, for example, and then Google for the info yourself.

And UW is pretty middle-of-the-road in terms of US faculty salaries... 56th percentile or thereabouts.

Professors in technical areas make large amounts of money, and are guaranteed their salary for life once they've been promoted once (to associate professor).

In my department, at the lowest level - assistant professor (tenure track, but not yet tenured) - they are making well north of 10K dollars a month. Full professors fall anywhere between 15K-25K a month.

On the other hand, professors in the arts or history departments make less than many staff earn.

Note that this is all public record - I'm not exactly giving away secrets.

Yes.

Keep up with current events, young'un - Google did an about-face on China over a year ago.

Google Shows China the White Flag of Surrender

Google hasn't been the "don't be evil" company for quite a while.