Even worse: The way the ADA is currently 'enforced' is through your local building inspection office. If you want to build a building, you can't get a permit until they review your plans for, among other things, ADA compliance. Somewhere, someone is planning a 'web site permit' to enforce this crap.

YES. If even a fraction of the money spent on constructing buildings for ADA compliance were spent on - say - researching mobility platforms that would enable the disabled to utilize buildings designed for able people, I believe that we would be waaaay ahead. As a developer/builder, I would much rather pay a fraction of what we spend on compliance into such a fund. So many of the regulations are completely overwrought and 'solve' problems that never existed to begin with.

Call me crazy, but I had a hard time figuring out how they were misreading this to begin with. I couldn't get my head around the idea that they were using '=' to mean "Evaluate", then adding 2. It didn't even occur to me to read it that way until I read through several comments. As a parent, I guess that there are two ways to look at this: 1. The generation currently in school is full of fail. Oh noes! or 2. Well, my kids are going to know math, even if I have to teach it to them myself. If all the other kids are morons, my kids will just have that much more of an advantage. Option 1 is the kneejerk response, option 2 sounds good...but then I stop to think that all those other moron kids get to vote and make decisions in society too. WTF.

It's easy to respond to such requests - just publish your raw data in the same place you publish your conclusions. This is *not* a budget thing.

Bottom line - the reviewer ignores a very important point. If you're sitting on a scandal, the last thing you want to do is release all the gory details. You may catch flak for not being 'open', but that's better than being open AND giving your critics the ammunition they need to sink you. The current state of academic research has drifted farther and farther from what we call the 'scientific method'. Peer review is often a joke, and politics has way too much to do with things. We have people in academia producing research that is beyond bogus, but so long as they can find a few other bogus researchers to pat them on the back for it, the charade continues. It gets even worse when the people doling out the money have fiercely political agendas and encourage the bullshit with a paycheck. Newton, Hooke, et al are rolling over in their graves...

that tries to make Mr. T give his real name!

$1 Million dollar budget? It's a nice gesture, but it seems pretty small for the responsibilities they're claiming this center to have. Seems more like a 'token' gesture made to *look* like they're doing something than taking real action to make things happen. That said, I'd rather see them save that money and get out of the way altogether...

The reason there's no 'good' home automation products is because there's not enough demand, pure and simple. At the end of the day, HA is 99% bling and maybe 1% utility. There's really only one 'problem' out there that HA-type technologies are suited to solving: energy. There are of course measureable ways to reduce a building's energy consumption through electronic controls. That said, there are plenty of ways that people have achieved this without delving into the realm of what's typically thought of as 'home automation'. Want to handle lighting based on occupancy? Buy a lightswitch with integrated PID for maybe $50. Want to handle climate control based on occupancy? Get a thermostat with a timer for $20 that will handle 98% of all circumstances. In the remaining 2%, walk your butt over and adjust the thermostat.

The primary difference between "Home Automation" systems and the sort of one-off solutions like thermostats and PID lightswitches is the network. Really, the advantages of having these devices know about one another in a practical environment are few-to-none.

Now, if you're the type that wants to have a girl over and impress her by pressing one button to dim the lights, close the curtains, and turn on the stereo, great. On the other hand, if you're the /. type who's taken the time to set up a system, you're probably paying her anyway so I doubt that's going to affect your chances of getting layed.

Reporters and the like are always trying to get an 'angle' obviously, but still - it's a little lame to emphasize the Lego portion of this. I love Legos, but let's face it - this apparatus could have been built out of many other things. The real 'science' behind this story is the construction of a scale model and details upon how the researchers were able to prove similitude between the large and micro scales. Not that pop sci articles aren't valuable, but using Lego as a hook to a legitimate science publication seems gimmicky.

...recursive no less.

CHUCK: CHUCK Hates Urban Combatants, Kill!

There are several good reasons. Of course cell call quality is an issue, as other posters have mentioned. However, there are others that are health-and-safety related. For example, many remote pacemaker checks require the use of a landline (and a handset that fits into the acoustic coupler, no less). Additionally, if you have a situation where you must have the best 911 emergency service possible, a landline is the way to go.

I'm just curious, did the researchers draw upon any of the Folding@Home work for this? Seems like simulating these sorts of interactions is sort of the point. I know F@H is primarily looking at proteins but just curious if any of the knowledge crosses over. Of course, 'Folding@Home' would make a great name for the desktop rapid prototyping machine based on this work. :)

The paper was titled, "Utilizing Pressure-sensitive Keyboards to Enhance the Realism of Real-Time Sexual Interactions between Three-Dimensional Avatars".

nt

...it's a space st.