From where I'm sitting, computing works best with a 3 tiered approach.

1. Primary computing from a desktop computer for all sorts of base station tasks, such as file archiving and downloading or gaming.
2. Secondary computing from a netbook for tasks that require the flexibility of windows or linux on x86, but with the portability and safety of a 250 dollar netbook instead.
3. Tertiary computing from a smart phone for tasks that don't require great flexibility or controls.

Even though I travel a lot now, I still find this paradigm applies. My base station is still great for having physically secure, reliable, safe storage and high powered processing power; my secondary computing comes from one of the new breed of laptops with netbook level processing power (full size laptop with an AMD c50 apu), but only because I spend so much time away from my base station. Despite having great uses for both of my computers, my mobile phone is perfect for a lot of times I won't have a real computer in front of me.

Netbooks and tablets both attempt to fill the niche of secondary computing. Most people can't afford a desktop replacement for secondary computing, or they don't want to travel with an expensive desktop replacement, or they can't handle the size or power or heat of a desktop replacement.

This guy sounds lawful neutral. The law allows you to be "free", but only to the point that the law tells you to stop. If we lived in soviet russia, his attitude may still be lawful neutral, and we'd get off way worse.

Not necessarily.

There are plenty of adaptions that make sense from a survival standpoint that don't make sense from a design standpoint. Immediately apparent, a body would limit growth in an environment where food is scarce. The increased protein required wouldn't hurt a rat in a cage fed a balanced diet, but could cost a rat in the wild its survival. Hence, despite having a more powerful body without real consequences, the mouse with this gene would be less survivable and thus the trait would be phased out over time.

I tend to disagree. ARM will do much better in the next few years as android becomes more mature for tablets. The price point for such a device is plummetting, we're going to reach a point where it's too easy to sell a netbook with android on ARM.

I'm running an Acer Aspire with an AMD C50 processor. Full size keyboard, big nice looking screen, and a powerful video card. Battery life is respectable. Probably could be much more with a third party battery. It ran me about as much money as the netbooks I've been buying left and right.

It's all about what you're using the machine for, but considering what I want this machine for (basically surfing the web during my many hours at airports), it works great, and best of all it doesn't run hot, unlike the V150 powered machine I had last.

You seem to have misunderstood me.

After paying rent payments for 360 months, I'll have more money than I would have paid towards the principle in my home. Therefore, after 360 months, I'll own a larger chunk of cash than I would have had equity in my home.

This means that after that 30 years, I could buy a house cash, and have a bunch of money in the bank, instead of having a house and being broke.

If that were the sole case, then smart phones wouldn't be on the radar. qwerty phones are way cheaper than smart phones.

The practices they used were faulty. That's why they were successfully charged in court for anti-competitive practices.

Thankfully, their product improved since they were convicted.

History shows that Republicans aren't small government. They're the biggest government folks of all.

There exists such a thing as "Squatter's rights", where those who abandon physical property can lose their claim to it. Similarly, if a company abandons their property and refuses to sell it to me, I shall take their actions as relinquishing the responsibility and thus relinquishing the fruits of ownership.

Actually, you're completely allowed to conceal facts. I've given a number of situations where this is true. I've even given situations where the law specifically protects secrets.

There's a powerful difference between "nice to have"s and "legally required to have"s. You keep using the word right, but a right is a very powerful and dangerous thing, and contrary to your belief, it isn't something that has basis in law.

For example, I'm not entitled to know the recipe and process for making coca cola. It is, in fact, a protected trade secret. Before buying a coke, or indeed before buying stock in coke, that information would be unquestionably relevant (to determining the value of your purchase, but just because it's nice to have, doesn't mean coca cola is ever required to tell you. You do NOT have a right to the information.

The entire stock market is based on the idea of getting the scoop on others who don't have the same information you do. In some cases it is restricted(insider trading, for example), but in most cases, the Warren Buffets of the world are rewarded, not punished, for buying securities at the wrong price and selling them at another much higher price. There is no basis to assume by selling a stock to Warren Buffett, you have a RIGHT to know the reasons he's buying the stock, which would certainly be an unquestionably relevant piece of information. The point of the stock exchange is to avoid an equal exchange of value, to try to get something that is actually much more valuable than the person selling it to you thinks it is.

There's a distinction between a legitimate *desire* and a legitimate *right*.

As a bank customer or a stock holder, I have a legitimate *desire* to have inside information, including trade secrets to best determine the risk involved with buying, holding, or selling the stock, or with doing business with a certain company. As a worker for a company who wants to know, I have a legitimate desire to have such information. However, I do not have a legitimate right to this information. I simply don't have the right.

Similarly, while banks may have a legitimate desire to know every single thing about us, they don't have any right to that information.

Your logic is completely wrong, because by the same logic that not giving people a list of your friends and family for vetting means the loan is "creation of a fraudulent contract", so too would someone who bought a stock before the company released information that affected stock price be "creation of a fraudulent contract", so too would people who did business with a company before the company released information that indicated that the company was about to disappear be "creation of a fraudulent contract", or hiring a worker by for a company hiding that they are likely to have lay-offs be "creation of a fraudulent contract".

Depends entirely on how much you have been paying for rent.

I've done the math, and the rent I pay for the house I'm in is significantly less than the land taxes, maintenance, and interest on the house would be if I owned it. Further, if the market crashes, I don't lose any capital, because I don't have any capital invested.

The whole "Renting is worse than owning" thing is fantastically over-simplified, and over-simplification of the home ownership equation (Particularly when the houses started costing a million dollars) is one of the issues that has lead to inflated house prices.

This is absolutely true. Worse is that it's management douchebags saying they can make these predictions, rather than anyone who could possibly build a solid scientific case.

Where employers use it, I can't help but think it's unfair (and more than a little creepy) asking us to be professional in our lives where we're not working for anyone, and not near anyone who we work with our would work with.

Where banks would use it to determine loans, I can't help but think it's unfair (and more than a little creepy) to be asking us to be credit-worthy when we're not paying bills, making money, spending money, and not around anyone or anything related to our ledgers.

blackberries aren't cheap.