They break unbelievably fast in comparison to any other brand I've tried.

Some people have problems with Seagate. Some have issues with WD. The Seagates in my soon-to-be-replaced colo box both have 50K+ hours on them, and the SMART logs are still clean as a whistle. I have standbys just in case though. ;-)

It would sure cut a lot of commuting if all a person needed to do to get to work was to take the elevator.

Probably would cut out a lot of time off too - "Dave, I know it's your day off, but can you come upstairs real quick to look at this server issue?"

for the same reasons that automatic transmissions last longer than manual trannies

Unless you know how to properly drive a car with a standard. Standards have far fewer points of failure, and the part that most often is replaced is the clutch, and that usually fails because people ride it or otherwise find a way to burn it up through improper use. Clutch repairs are something I can do in my driveway and are reasonably inexpensive. Practically anything involving an automatic (aside from changing fluid/filter) involves taking it to a shop, and often ends up costing thousands of dollars. There's a reason you don't often see tractor-trailers with automatics, and they can go hundreds of thousands of miles before needing transmission service.

The trucks and vans can be self driving too.

Self-driving trucks will entail a *far* more comprehensive level of automation than cars. Just getting a tractor-trailer to make a successful turn at a tight, busy intersection will be an interesting problem to solve.

Sure frustrated drivers will force their way into the fast lane and jam up traffic (as they do now), but the cars will record the reckless driving, likely by a few 'angles', eventually, it'll become a citation to do it.

It's already against the law to do this (in most places in the U.S., anyway), and I see the police ignore it all the time even when it's happening right in front of them. If they spent half the time on enforcing left-lane and improper turn laws as they do on speeding, they'd have full coffers and much smoother-flowing traffic to boot. Probably would also have a downtick in accidents too.

Regarding the NDAs that have been signed with Harris and the government not to disclose information regarding the Stingray devices - I was under the impression that a civil contract could not override state or federal law, and any such clauses requiring such are non-enforceable. These judges need to be finding every single one of the officers and prosecutors in contempt when they present "but we're under an NDA" as an argument in a court of law.

That's right, rather than keep my computer running through power outages, it was shutting my computer off during stable power.

I've had battery failures before as well, but they've never shut the power off. Only ones I've seen that will do that are true UPSs instead of the *much* more popular standby UPSs, which is part of the reason I bought standby units to begin with. There aren't too many anymore that can't switch to battery power fast enough to keep a PC up, and if you're using a true UPS that doesn't spit out a true sine wave (most are stepped square wave), it'll shorten the lifespan on your power supply considerably.

Which is why I roll my eyes at the people proclaiming their UPS goes on their cable modem and firewall, not their computer.

I have mine on both the computers and the DSL modem and router and some other hardware (not printers!), mostly because I run a PBX and VoIP phones, and don't want to lose a call in progress.

Most decent UPSs have batteries that can be replaced. As I mentioned before, I change mine out every two years or so. They're not expensive.

On the flip side, the two UPSs that I have running my boxes have both lasted more than nine years. I replace the batteries every couple of years and check the MOVs and coils at the same time. They've saved my bacon enough times to have been worth 10 times the expense.

The Federal government was to provide for the common defense, and currency, primarily.

And arbitrating disputes between the States, and regulating interstate commerce, which sadly has become a catchall to let them do practically anything they want.

I understand we also like being the "biggest fish in the pond", although I question the methods we use to achieve that status.

It's hard *not* to be the biggest fish in the pond when you're on a steady diet of fast food.

... is that they'd better have those units in the south range repaired by midday or there'll be hell to pay.

two words: Laurette Spang.

One word: Noms. Double noms for Maren Jensen, though.

I would much rather look at Katie Sackoff than Dirk Benedict. I would even say it again.

I liked Katee's Starbuck more than Dirk's as well. I especially liked her response to Dirk's criticism of the reboot and her character in particular: "If you add up the amount of time Dirk Benedict spent playing the character, not the years obviously but the number of episodes, I'm more Starbuck than he is, so put that in your pipe and smoke it."