Animats: Laser weapons are in the same state - there are working demos, but they're not worth the trouble yet. Diode laser powered weapons are now up to 10KW (big array of 10W or so diodes), and can shoot down small rockets and artillery shells in demos. Current thinking is that, at 50KW-100KW, they'll be militarily useful.

Navy has (or is testing) some higher-powered ones, basically five or ten welding lasers strapped together, but the power and cooling requirements are huge.

Worthless article without images.

Even some of the web-linked articles don't have images.

Bad click-bait article aside, it is typical that the USA (and other nations) develop weapons systems that they never end up "needing to use." Weapons systems can be seen as a kind of insurance policy, but it can be damned hard from keeping the hawks from wanting to go play with their toys (kill people) all the time.

When I've lived in northern climates, I've occasionally had a couple of tanning sessions to fight the winter blues. It works great.

I use this in my classes — the myDAQ from National Instruments (DAQ=digital acquisition).

It's USB plug-and-play, with a few basics like oscilloscope (200 kS/s, 16-bit), DSA (digital signal analyzer), signal generator, and Bode analyzer built-in, through use of it's "ELVISmx Instrument Launcher." Better yet is that it comes with a non-expiring copy of LabView.

It has:
* DMM ports (digital multimeter)
* 8 digital I/O
* A/D audio I/O, +/-2 V
* A/D I/O, +/- 10V
* Power supply +/- 15 V
* Counter

Cost it $180, for example through www.studica.com.

[citation needed]

I fear for my (soon to be former) country.

How many Roadside Bombs did we have in the USA in 2013?

None? Well, how about 2012?

None? Well, how about 2011?

None? Well, how about 2010?

Continue, ad infinitum.

If law enforcement needs this type of equipment, then it has long abandoned any pretense of serving the people and has instead reverted to its original purpose of fighting the people for those in power.

Indeed. "To protect and to serve..." has been perverted into "To protect (ourselves) and to serve (those in power)..."

What I wonder every time I see this: do the law enforcement officers involved ever think something like, "wow, by doing this I become one of the jack-booted thugs working hard to bring tyranny and corruption to this nation!" Are they complete myrmidons?

Anyone with an IQ above 105-110 is barred from becoming a police officer.

Examples abound, in the US and elsewhere, so I'll let you find examples of this long-known fact.

All lasers have a finite beam divergence. The light is not perfectly collimated (it is not from infinity).

With high powered lasers (that are surprisingly easy to come by) [wickedlasers.com] a fraction of a second is all it takes to cause serious and often permanent eye injury. [wikipedia.org]

Ahem. Beam divergence.

At the distance an aircraft would be from the laser-pointer, the spot will have spread sufficiently that this is not the case.

If you solve this problem (you're not), the Navy and Air Force will make you rich.

Why would I ever want my refrigerator to have internet access?

The marketers, sure, they want me to think that I need that. But, really, what conceivable value or advantage would the ($30-extra purchase price) confer to me?

None? Well, I must be a sucker.

Or, wait, I have to actually exert more effort to maintain the internet security of my refrigerator, which wasn't and should have never been internet-connected in the first place? If you find yourself in this latter situation, you are dumber than a sucker, mark, or rube. You are the problem.

FTSummary: ...also highlighted iCloud Drive. Although a little late to the party, Apple hopes to compete with the likes of Dropbox and Google Drive.

DropBox will drop its pants for the NSA any time, anywhere, with no FISA court order required. Apple, not so much.

Well, LAPD flies their helicopters at less than 50 feet altitude, in the middle of the night, in Santa Monica — which is NOT in their jurisdiction.

I've seen 4 X 8 foot panels of plywood flying around a home-remodeling site across the street due to the helicopter down-draft. And this was on a night with no major crimes. That is, it was "just for practice." Never mind that the public, whom they are supposed to protect and to serve, are being awakened for 2-3 hours in the middle of the night, and suffer property damage.

Having personally observed the above behavior, it's essentially guaranteed that TFA's drones will be used in an escalating series of invasive methods – especially ones that the law does not yet specifically prohibit.

LAPD have long been known to be excessively power-hungry, abusive, racist, and eager to use excessive force. These drones are just another tool to enable their continuing subjugation of the citizenry.

Readers who do not understand the "one good seat" phenomenon of curved TVs are politely referred to any elementary geometry high-school textbook.