Come on we remember the headline rule. It ends with a question mark and the answer is no.

My son loves Lego. When he was very young he always wanted the Star Wars kits. He would build them and would learn to follow the instructions. Usually within a couple of weeks he would pull it all apart and then create something new - of course the instructions usually go missing as well. A few years later he now has big buckets of Lego (of almost every shape and size) and constantly surprises me what he can build from it all.

It's a pity some of the kits are so expensive.

The kits are a great way to get kids involved and because it's Lego the kits from other franchises fit too.

The writers of the article are idiots for writing such drivel.

Have I missed something?

Why is this community so hostile to the Raspberry Pi?

I know we are a cynical bunch here but anything Pi-related is usually slated here.

If they offered a spam topping on their pizza then I'll be interested.

Little rectangular squares of ambrosia..mmmmm.....pizza....

I used to get texts from Pizza Hut until I asked them to stop. However if Papa John ignored their own "stop" requests they shouldn't be surprised if they get fined (mind you $500 per text is a bit excessive).

Generally it's a shit article - there are more interesting products they could have featured (as mentioned in other posts).

I have an S3 and downloaded a few apps. Before installation you're told what permissions the app wants on your device.

E.g. the Facebook app seems to want every permission it can get it's grubby hands on thus I've chosen not to install it.

Unless app developers are using workarounds.

Funnily enough it is no surprise that many of the "free" apps seem to want the most permissions.

I bought a "fire sale" touchpad last year and I am impressed with the hardware.

WebOS was a slick OS - swipe gestures are intuitive too.

WebOS was then open-sourced - components were released in a timely manner and then the punchline - "Not compatible with existing devices!!!".

I installed cyanogen ICS (Andoird 4) tenderloin and never looked back - the only hardware that doesn't work is the camera - no big deal.
It even has accelerated GPU - I can quite happily play Minecraft PE.

Current score:
0 HP
1 Cyanogen Developers

On the strength of the ICS experience I now own a shiny new quad-core Samsung S3 - my Nokia N900 is now facing imminent retirement - again great hardware & OS (Maemo) but again, retarded company decisions killed the product!

I sort of understand why Mozilla have done this - they're only talking about the "App marketplace" not development of the browser itself - they are trying to raise funds for Firefox development by selling apps. (I assume).

That's how I understand it, then again I stopped using Firefox last year and switched to Chromium - the open-source version of Chrome - they are also forks of Chromium designed to remove all sorts of tracking code too.

Most people I know have switched away from Firefox and are using Chrome or Chromium instead.

The best thing about Chrome/Chromium is they are part of the "webkit family" which means wider support and consistent HTML5 adherence.

Firefox is feeling a bit dated anyway - All I can say is "Good Luck with that" Mozilla!

Slashdot is a different beast now.

I've been following Slashdot since the 90s and it just seems to be evolving into another unfocused blog.

I loved reading Slashdot everyday(mostly!) but it just is not the same anymore.

As a geek I felt I belonged to a site like this and felt very comfortable here. It's also one of the very few sites where I can be arsed actually commenting on anything.

But over the past few weeks the story submissions are becoming less relevant to me now and Slashdot has become a less interesting place to be.

Not to mention this new "B.I. feature" contains a link to "choosing the right database for your business" - yeah telling a site full of IT geeks how to choose the right database is a "smart" thing to do (even from a "business" perspective) - how patronising!

Your post was definitely on-topic.

However, mine is not.

I think the moderators need to curb their crack pipe habits. A stoned monkey on mind-altering drugs trying to solve a rubiks cube can do considerably better. Slashdot is a shadow of its normal self.

My post will no doubt be marked troll.

Interesting, why is my comment tagged as "Troll"?

Expensive mobile device and overzealous company policy..oh proprietary format too.

The device flopped over Christmas here in the UK & retailers were desperately promoting special offers and discounts as soon as it was released.

Sony & Nintendo have to learn the mobile gaming sector has got a lot more competitive and in most cases competitor's games are cheaper too.

I'm afraid this business model is done.

I thought "Honeybadger" was stoopid. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4r7wHMg5Yjg

Wow! Back in the day (70s-80s) Sony made some cool stuff - I'm talking about Trinitron tvs, open-reel tape machines and awesome stereos. The quality was amazing. A popular "rule-of-thumb" was you can gauge the quality of a CRT-based telly was how heavy it was - Sony was always heaviest!!!! Until some competitors were caught adding lead(?) weights into the tv box!!

Sony is a sad shadow of it's former self.

Well done Sony you are on the road to utter irrelevance.

This was my biggest problem with Game - used games were waaayyyy overpriced - they dropped their prices last week(?) and funnily enough the shelves seem to empty pretty quickly.

I still think there is a market for a specialist games store. Maybe have a few consoles and allow gamers to try before buy, if possible legally download content onto media (if future consoles will still use it) and a decent online store will help too.

The business failed due to bad management.

Maybe it would be easier if you replaced the 's' & 't' with 'c'?

The parent comment is retarded. How is it moderated insightful?

"I'm the target demographic for this product. "

No your NOT! It's target is education and "third-world" countries

"Yes, it's a cute piece of hardware, yes it's cheap. No, it's not revolutionary or game-changing."

It has potential to be "game-changing" because IT education in the UK is a joke - technical ability is shunned in favour of teaching Microsoft products instead. The Pi project is an attempt to start a similar UK computer culture as seen in the 1980s.

" We've had plenty of SBCs in the past that do pretty much what it can do."

At the current price - no, not really a 700mhz cpu AND gpu with 256mb ram, 2xusb and ethernet for $25?

"And the stupid thing is, I'm a robotics researcher and an electronics hobbiest to boot"

No the stupid thing is, you're stupid for not checking your facts first.

" I'm so sick of hearing about it I'm not going to buy one out of interest."
It's a charity and publicity is important to attract donors, sponsors and other sources of income. Producing hardware is an expensive undertaking.

As the saying goes "Ignorance is bliss" aka "twitchy slashdot commenter"

I also slay your troll-like posting with the following quotes from the Raspberry Pi "about" page: (Obviously your troll-like eyes are too tired to read the "about" page)

"..The idea behind a tiny and cheap computer for kids came in 2006, .."
" became concerned about the year-on-year decline in the numbers and skills levels of the A Level students applying to read Computer Science in each academic year."
"the 1990s where most of the kids applying were coming to interview as experienced hobbyist programmers, the landscape in the 2000s was very different;"
" David has been tireless in raising press awareness and finding us sponsorship."
"We’ve had enormous interest, support and help from the educational community, and we’ve been delighted and a little humbled by the number of enquiries from agencies and people far away from our original targets for the device."
"The Raspberry Pi Foundation is a UK registered charity (Registration Number 1129409)"