You know that when DC motors spin they generate electricity, right? ...and your fan motor is connected to your motherboard.

PC fans use brushless motors, which don't do that.

Lots of things that look like they shouldn't fly, do in fact fly.

My favourite is the Blohm & Voss BV 141.

While we're talking about those wacky nazis, the Me 323 is just too ugly to be allowed to fly.

Unless, after launching, it continued to fly under its own power. At that point we can safely call it a plane.

From what I can see, that would make it a sustainer motor glider.

The Wright brothers, Whitehead, Santos Dumont and Pearse were all significant, but I don't think any of them could truly claim to have invented the aeroplane.

Ailerons are only used for banking, if they're used as flaps as well they're called flaperons.

I bet it took whole seconds to come up with that name.

See also:
Spoileron
Elevon
Stabilator

And here's another link to the aeroelastic wing.

The words "supersonic" and "stealth" are mutually exclusive.

You can have a plane that can do both, but not at the same time.

On every car I've ever driven, the handbrake operates the rear brake pads/shoes by a cable. I have no idea what the steel plate you're referring to is, but it's clearly not universal.

What TFA is missing is that Renault Lagunas don't have an ignition key, they have an electronic card and a start button.

From what other posters are saying, it seems there's no way to turn the engine off while the vehicle is moving. I can see Renault getting some flak for that design decision, if it's true.

I thought the definitions were like this:

A mainframe turns an I/O bound problem into a compute bound problem.
A supercomputer turns a compute bound problem into an I/O bound problem.

I can't remember where I found that.

Modern? Pump-jet propulsors were invented in 1954 and have been used on submarines since the late 1960s.
I'd be interested to hear why the USN were so late to the party.

I'll let you off because you said you're generalising, but some of the Windows Mobile 5 phones had no keyboard, just a few buttons. Of course they had resistive touchscreens and no multi-touch, but what would you expect in 2003ish?
The did expose the file system, but it was in a "you shouldn't be looking at this" kind of way, even though you had to use it. It was certainly pointing the way, even if it was a kludge.
I doubt there was another product using multi-touch before the iPhone, but I know better than to make claims like that on Slashdot. ;)

Apart from multi-touch, there were plenty. They were mostly made by HTC and sold with the carrier's name on them.
They typically ran Windows Mobile 5 and you could install anything you liked on them, without the carrier's permission.
I even wrote the odd app for them for internal use at my job.

They were big and chunky, I can't say I liked them. But they prove you wrong, don't they?

Do we always have to have car analogies?

You've obviously never heard of the way the Honda/Acura NSX completly outshone the Ferarri 348. Also, the F430 has one of the ugliest interiors I've seen in a such an expensive car - is that part of the complete package?

How much of that applies to Apple is another matter, but don't think for a moment that they are in an unassailable position. There is no such thing.

Bing maps is useless on my Android phone. It's damn near impossible to tap the icons without the map panning instead.

I want to use Bing maps for one reason. You get Ordnance Survey maps in the UK. Google maps can't compete with the national mapping agency.

The interface makes it a win for Google, at least until Microsoft release the Bing app in the UK.

There are 14 gas cooled reactors in the UK. I'm not going to say that they're better than PWRs and BWRs, but AGRs are out there too.

Are you seriously trying to suggest that apple.com is the only place you can buy phones online?

Android phones do outsell iPhones, but iPhones outsell all individual Android models. HTC, LG and Samsung have a broader range so each model sells less, but Apple is still the largest seller of smartphones overall.

I'm not sure who's in the lead when you consider all mobile phones, not just smart phones. I know Nokia sell a stupid number of cheap phones in Africa, but I doubt they make much profit on them.