On my feed reader, this item came up beside some stuff about http://www.fasterthanthewind.org/ where a vehicle made a record for sailing down wind at just shy of 3 times the speed of the wind. They did so by turning the problem on it's side and inside out a bit -- you can read more there if you want to. In any case, I was beginning to wonder if the concepts (not the mechanics, but the energy balances they achieved) could be used to make a solar sailing space craft that travels down the solar wind at some pretty impressive speeds.

Just a thought. I have no idea what that would look like, and the solar wind is pretty fast, so it may not make much sense (unless the system would at least increase the rate of accelleration over the current design of sail for the same surface area.) None the less, I would love to see if someone who understands the physics better than I could take a go at what such a system would look like, and what would have to be changed or discovered to make it happen.

4" is a wide definition. The focal length, optical type (a 4" refactor is a very different beast than a 4" reflector, and there are lots of options in-between), and available eyepieces factor in. None the less, planetary targets are usually impressive.

The moon is always a good choice. Don't wait for a full moon -- partial phases are more interesting because the lighting and shadows emphasize just how bumpy the moon is.

I have a 4" F13 scope (roughly 52" focal length -- 1350mm), and it's not bad for brighter nebulae as well, such as M42 in orion, and galaxies such as the Andromeda galaxy.

I expect that part of the problem here is the low population density compared to other markets.
Simply put, Canada has about the same landmass of the continental united states (I had to look that up, but it's actually surprisingly close), but only 1/10 the number of people. The population density of the USA is listed as 32 people per km^2, Canada is 3.2/km^2. A few city-only serivces have existed: Fido, for example, but they were bought up because Canadians travel alot, and really really want good coverage on the major highways. When you are 200-300 km from anywhere, it's kinda nice to have a bar or two on your phone. That means that it is hard to draw customers to the city-only services in the long term.

Don't get me wrong: Rogers and friends are still turning an insane profit on our backs, but sometimes that is just the way it works. At least those profits are mostly staying in Canadian hands.

To build out a new cellular network takes a considerable amount of capital to provide coverage for enough people to make it worthwhile. I don't think the cell operators need collusion to keep the prices high -- since a new player either needs the money and time to build out a network, or they have to pay an existing player to offer a virtual cell network -- and you can bet that the existing players are .

The only reason we are getting new carriers finally is that the CRTC stepped in and is forcing existing players to provide that virtual network capability at a wholesale price that lets the new carriers compete. In other words, they are regulating a way to prevent the carriers from a making such a big profit and opening the field to competition. Some of that competition is being funded from non-canadian sources, which I am not sure is such a great thing: It will be years before the competition amongst carriers makes a dent in the rates we are paying, and in the meanwhile, that means sending the profits out of the country, which for Canada has never been such a good thing.

I think what it comes down to is that all the options suck, and the new options suck just as bad as the old ones, and it's only going to get worse.

How about

construction season -> hunting season
hunting season-> hibernation season
Hibernation season -> construction season

So is that evidence of alien visitation?

I just wanted to point out that while they are not pure aluminum, Sapphire, ruby, and several other transparent or nearly transparent gem stones are crystals made up of aluminum oxide -- colors are caused by natural or synthetic doping with trace elements. Chances are, if you have an expensive analog watch, you probably have a piece of 'transparent aluminum' ensuring your time piece is readable and does not get scratched easily.

I have a real problem with getting too excited over this article, and clearly the people who did the work are playing on star trek's popularity to garner more media attention than is really warranted.

I have never had a flash drive long enough to wear out the flash cells, and I can't say I have seen them fail electrically.

I have however gone through at least 5 usb keys over the last few years, all due to physical abuse:
-Laundry (went through at least twice without failing, 3rd time's the charm)
-Loose/worn USB contacts: at least two different drives, after that I stopped buying the cheapest ones available
-Soup: Spilled in my bike bag, and caused the usb key to corrode internally, and probably caused a short because I didn't notice the soup had leaked into the casing until after I plugged it in
-Clumsiness: I dropped one on a hard wood floor, and then rolled over it with my desk chair. Another one broke the USB contacts off when I tripped and banged it with my leg. At least that one left a nice bruise in self defense.

I would love to see a completely sealed usb key that uses something like the Apple laptop power cable connections (mag safe, I think it is called) for the connection. Perhaps if it had a titanium case and complete water-proof seal, it might survive my abuse for more than 3 months!

The anonymous posters were allegedly posting hate speech. Hate speech becomes a problem because the people targeted by the hate speech have rights to personal safety and security vs. the posters rights to free speech. Note that hate speech is speech specifically pushing for hate crimes to be performed against individuals of the hated group, as opposed to just an exchange of opinions.

I wanted to point this out because while there is value in anonymous free speech, even for people who I disagree with, there is a point where this kind of speech leads to actual harm, and I fully support the court in bringing these people to justice.

calls 2 hippos on the phone...

I have read that Sandra Boyton book to my 3 year old so many times I can recite it from memory.

I fear I will be 85 and going senile, and I will still be able to counts hippos.

I have one of these mercury key chains -- a christmas present -- and it does indeed present itself as a CDROM drive in order to get the autoplay to run.

Of course, I am still trying to figure out if this particular alert is an actual problem, or if it is just a packed executable to save space on the device.