I think you are wrong, and I think you are not going to get a proprietary alternative that's as fast as it could be. The interfaces needed to make graphics faster on Linux are all EXPORT_SYMBOL_GPL, meaning that they can't legally be used by proprietary (read: faster) kernel modules. So basically, the interfaces that are needed are, in fact, politicized.

I thought APIs couldn't be copyrighted? You know, like what the Oracle v. Google Android-Java lawsuit was all about?

If so, then without copyright protection GPL is worthless - GPL requires copyright in order to work (because copyright gives you certain rights - GPL gives you MORE rights in exchange for agreeing to certain conditions - if you don't agree, your basic rights under copyright law apply). In that case the APIs are unprotected.

But if you want to claim GPL protects those APIs, then it also means Oracle has a point w.r.t. Android's implementation of Java.

Did Dice ditch unicode support? I thought the slash code always had issues/didn't support it, long before Dice acquired them.

Slashcode always supported Unicode.

The reason it appears it doesn't is that thanks to a bunch of wankers who decided to abuse Unicode to no end, it ended up screwing the site layout up thanks to abuse of control codes.

So what was added was an input filter that limited what Unicode could come in - pretty much just ASCII at this point.

Unicode IS complex, and you really cannot blindly handle "all of it" because there will be odd edge cases you will NOT have thought of. And even more so as it's not a static character set - today you might think you handled all the edge cases, but tomorrow the new Unicode spec may introduce more and now you have more edge cases and combinations to test.

A couple of years ago it seems Slashcode implemented an output Unicode filter as well - because the old pages that were screwed up by the Unicode abuse no longer are screwed up. But their legacy lives on - Google for ":erocS" on /.

(Yes, abuse of the right-to-left override meant you could "fakemod" yourself by pretending you had a +5 mod)

And ActiveX got a severe makeover in IE7. So much so that practically everything broke. Which is why IE6 hung around so long.

Of course, you have admit that South Korea is FINALLY getting around to fixing it given IE7+ has been around for years now. I'm guessing Windows 7 and XP Mode support is getting harder to come by?

I tried for a day to get Linux installed on my Mac. I thought Boot Camp would be perfect; it repartitioned the drive nicely, but I couldn't get Linux to load. I couldn't delete the Windows partition, couldn't remake it as a Linux partition. Eventually gave up. Is there a way to do this?

It's a lot easier now than it was in the past, but all you need to do avoid legacy boot.

And that's what happened here - Apple stopped supporting legacy boot.

Instead, it's UEFI firmware does a UEFI boot, which has been supported in Linux for ages (at least to Ubuntu 8.04 or earlier).

And you need to think EFI boot.

Once you do that, it's easy. In fact, there are so many tutorials on installing Linux on Macs that I think you didn't google at all.

Anyhow, first thing first, you need to overwrite the Mac EFI boot manager - the one that gives you that nice startup disc selection. It's just an EFI application. Use something like rEFIt and you're done. It's just a more sophisticated boot manager.

From there, use rEFIt to boot your EFI-based OS. Like Linux (you know how on the CD it has that "BOOT/EFI" directory? Bingo).

In fact, Windows 7 can EFI boot - it has EFI support right there. Many laptops that come with Windows 7 use EFI mode rather than legacy boot, which is a huge PITA if you try to reinstall.

Of course, it's only a matter of time before someone re-writes the compatibility module so you can boot the EFI application to do a legacy boot.

What is the purpose of security alerts if not to warn people who don't know any better? For the crowd that gets it, you could flash a brief icon featuring a guy fawkes mask and that'd be sufficient. I also wonder how many of them would click "proceed anyway" if the pr0ns were there...

The purpose is because the developer doesn't know how to do it properly.

The problem is developers don't want to acknowledge the security problem and are just passing it off - it's called Dancing Pigs (or rabbits, whatever) and the basic concept is given a choice, a user will choose one that compromises security every time. If you ask them to click through a warning dialog to get to the pr0n, guess what? They will!

Plus, there's also an over saturation of warnings. They're like EULAs - the vast majority of people just do not read them.They become just another obstacle in the way to accomplishing what they want.

The reality is, Dancing Pigs is real, and it's really a tough choice in handling it. Walled gardens is one way, and it can be quite successful, but there's always the edge cases and the "but I wanna do this!" crowd - you can choose to ignore them, or handle them. But even handling them may not be a good choice - see Android's "Allow Non-Play Store Apps" checkbox that's all or nothing. With it checked, you can sideload, but what if you just want to use apps from another store, like say, Amazon? You can't just allow Amazon and block everyone else.

It's even harder if you want to cater to the average user (who really wants to just get their work done) and those of developers (who want to play with the computer) - you can lock it down, let users get their work done, but the developers will complain of inflexibility. Or you can make it cater to developers, but then users will complain of complexity and "why do I have to learn all this just to do X? Why are you wasting my time making me learn all this extra crap just so I can produce this one report?"

(Or, for a more cynical take - thank you Mr. Developer, because making me take an extra hour to learn it means I can bill you an extra hour! Yeah, not what you want to see from your lawyer, accountant, mechanic or other person - having that hour billed to YOU...)

Think of the "decency" statues for broadcast TV. Sometimes you can swear (playing Saving Private Ryan) sometimes you can't (some random award show) Sometimes you can show nudity (NYPD Blue) sometimes you can't (Superbowl?) The FCC will let you know you violated the unspecified rules via a fine
well after the fact.

The reason for this is simple - the FCC for this operates on a complaint basis. Now some rather conservative parents got their panties in a knot over "wardrobe malfunction" (no doubt helped by massive publicity about it) who see a boob and panic that their children will now turn into masturbating sex-crazed addicts from that brief exposure to nudity.

These days though, those groups are now concentrating on apps - it's why forced Apple to clear the App Store of porn apps (because the same group decided to methodically go and complain about each and every porn app).

Nonsense, I totally think kids should be in new cars...

New cars tend to have the best safety equipment, or at least better than what was standard 5-10 years ago.

I think so too. However, I think the parents should pick the car - pick a boring car that's known for extreme reliability, and low cost.

Something like the utterly dull Toyota Corolla - just a boring vehicle but with good reliability.

A new car gives them the newest safety equipment, but also is generally more reliable. Last thing a parent wants is to worry about their kid stuck in a broken down vehicle. Just something that will reliably get them from point A to point B for a few years then they can upgrade to another car.

TL/DR: Javascript+HTML5 is the new Java applet + Flash Player + ActiveX control.

But it's far better than before. Because Flash Player and ActiveX you were limited to waiting for a third party to fix the flaw. There's nothing the browser vendor or the user could do. JavaScript/HTML5? The browser vendor's at fault and hell, it may even be possible to fix it yourself.

JavaScript/HTML5 may be the new vulnerability, but it's a lot easier to fix the issue. If the vulnerability was in Flash Player or some random ActiveX object, you're stuck waiting for Adobe or other third party to make the fix. With JavaScript/HTML5, the browser vendor can fix it, if it's open source, you or the community can fix it.

So yeah, there's vulnerabilities, but the resolution of which is far easier. It may even be simply switching browsers!

Especially if the any of this ill gotten intelligence serves to save you or your loved ones from dying horribly right?

Get impaired off the road first and maybe you'll have a point. And by impaired, I mean by distraction (e.g., phones), drugs, or alcohol.

It's sort of funny how "terrorism" doesn't actually kill a lot of people - overall, traffic accidents cause far more fatalities and the ones dying are rarely the ones who made the poor decision.

So yes, getting hit by an impaired driver is often a terrible way to go because there's little you could've done to prevent it.

Me too, since the only reason they want you to use their router is in the first place is to price gouge with rental fees.

Not the only reason. Some are now using these routers to set up a hotspot from your home. Peeps connectin' for free - what could go wrong?

Now of course, that's silly economics. If people can legally mooch off their neighbors, why would they pay for their own connection? so everyone decides to drop their service at the same time, including the person who was the last unwitting provider in the hood.

To use those hotspots require you to be a subscriber of said service. So if you're a Comcast subscriber, you can use those Comcast hotposts that Comcast makes available.

If your neighbors want to use your hotspot, they're still paying for internet service. Just a crappier version of it because the hotspot one is usually rate limited. They could just instead use the one they're paying for.

It's not "free wifi" - it's a gated access wifi - as long as you're a subscriber to internet service from that company, you can use that hotspot.

Mooching off your neighbours means yours sits idle. Comcast or whoever still gets their pound of flesh from you every month. (And your neighbor is free to mooch off your modem since they subscribe to the same service).

And yes, it's an annoyance if you're in a marginal area with overlap and your wifi switches from your home router to your neighbor's.

OK, IANAL, so help me out here. If that's the case, why do plaintiffs get anything at all? Why not just give all the compensation to the lawyers and let those naive plaintiffs go make themselves whole? Why in the heck should the legal system care about people who were damaged in the first place?

Well, it's because the purpose of the courts is to try to make yourself whole. Except in the case of a class action, where it's practically impossible.

You see, a class action lawsuit is designed for instances where the defendant causes damage as a whole, but individually, not so much. Let's say your cellphone carrier overbills you $1 a month. On contract. Over two years, that's an extra $24. Will you go take them to court over it? Even small claims will have a larger filing fee.

Now, let's say the same cell carrier has only 10M customers. Doing this "overbilling" nets them an extra $10M a month, or $120M a year. Really, a decent chunk of money.

Now, some customers will complain, but if you do it every month, you'll wear them down (you can put them on hold for 30 minutes and most people will forget about the $1).

individually, no customer is hurt big, but as a whole, damage was caused. And hell, because it's so profitable, others want in as well - imagine your insurance provider doing the same, your TV provider, your internet provider, etc. etc. etc. All skimming an extra few bucks a month.

And you can get away with a lot before people start to find it's worth it to file a lawsuit.

Now, what kind of compensation do you want? I mean everyone was hurt only a little bit, so the actual "make whole" part is pretty small.

And you're perfectly free to opt out of the class action and bring forth your own suit to be made whole again. Just it's likely to cost you more time and money than it's worth.

What you propose already happens today - you're free to opt out (and you have until they start distributing the awards to do so, so if you think what they give Is lame, you're free to pursue your own lawsuit).

They are on rural land, clearly not within the airspace of an actual tower,

Non-sequitor. You can be in controlled airspace over rural property. In fact, the airport where I did my training was like that. There was a suburb to the west of it, but to the east was all farmland, highways and a bog, all in controlled airspae Granted, it was uncontrolled below 1500', but that was because there were two airparks nearby there as well.

What's the point of requiring a license and medical?

Here's where /. ignorance shows. (For a group of people who desire everyone not be ignorant of something (i.e., computers), they are plenty ignorant of other things, it seems)

A pilot's license doesn't actually expire. Once you have it, you have it. Neither does the radio license. They're both yours until you die. There's nothing you can really do to get rid of that.

Ah, but you say, surely the FAA can revoke it, right? Sort of. You see, just having a pilot's license and a radio license doesn't make you legal to fly anywhere. You have to have a medical - the trifecta of pilot's license, radio license and medical makes you legal to fly anywhere in the world. The medical expires, needs to be renewed, and is a required document if you want to fly. So what the FAA and other regulatory bodies do is they simply cancel the medical (which is tied to your license), thereby grounding you. You may wonder about Sport Pilot licenses - those aren't internationally recognized at all and the FAA probably wants the easier option of cancelling a medical.

So the medical serves as a way to enforce legal action should the conditions of the drone's operation be violated. The FAA is basically requiring there be a person of authority on the record for the flight who will conduct it in a safe manner. And presumably, would ensure that the flight has overrides in case things go awry - it is possible to exceed 400' should a wind pick up and the drone gets sudden lift.

And no, 400' may be uncontrolled, but it's not anything goes - the FAA has enforced legal action against those operating aircraft (drones) in a clearly unsafe manner despite within rules for RC flight per advisory circular. In this case someone was basically using their drone to buzz people in a park - diving at bystanders, flying erratically through a narrow tunnel filled with pedestrians, etc. (the video the idiot took clearly showed pedestrians scrambling away from the drone) The FAA sought action, was rebuffed initially by the NTSB, appealed, and got a ruling that said the FAA is well within their enforcement powers to pursue those operating aircraft in an unsafe manner. There's plenty of aerial activity below 400' - crop dusting, regular flights and such.

Wouldn't it just be easier to have a dip switch and require cracking the case open to flash the bios? At least then, a switch can detect the case opening and send a signal to something or tick a counter that can be checked every once in a while easily.

Two problems.

First, BIOS updates are made much more difficult with a switch - expecting a user to dig around to update is a support nightmare.

Also, that works great on desktops, but laptops are a significant seller (remember laptops started outselling desktop PCs 10 years ago), so having users poke around and unscrew flaps while the computer is on so they can hit buttons to flash gets tricky, quick.

Then there's the need to be able to detect the position of the switch in software so you can generate a nice error message - nothing is more scary than "FLASHING FAILED!" and the user being stuck with an unbootable system because they forgot to push a button or other thing.

And then there's those Steve Jobs emails that revealed major players in Silicon Valley created their own de facto non-compete policies with each other. The study is incomplete without examining intra-California career stifling.

That only affected "pull" style recruitments - where a company recruits from another company.

You as an employee were completely free to apply for a position at the other company. If you worked at Apple and wanted to go to Google, you submitted your resume to Google. If Google liked you, you interviewed and got hired.

What Google couldn't do is go to an Apple employee and make them an immediate offer.

And there are PLENTY of ways around this - including the use of mutual friends to say "Please apply for this job" - the only thing Google would want is to make sure it is YOU that made the first move.

Which is why the scope of it is extremely limited - if people want you, you know it and are free to apply. And if you networked properly, you would hear about the opportunity through your grapevine with no official documentation saying it really was Google poaching you in the end. All it takes is a few phone calls and you're in.

How do I know? I was part of this - I knew a company wanted me, and someone I knew at that company basically said "Phone (xxx) 555-5555". Made the call and they said they were posting a job that I should apply for (basically it was tailored for me). It was a public posting, so anyone could apply, but really it was my job to lose. And the only official documentation that existed would be my accessing the public jobs site.

All perfectly legit. Sort of a loophole, but none of the agreements said you couldn't work there, just they won't pull you.

And really, in the end, if you're being pulled, it's because you know someone there. Google will not call up random Apple employees offering them a job - they'd consult with employees who worked at Apple to pick specific employees.

Even at a job fair - if Apple employees walked past the Google booth, as long as it was on the up and up (Apple employees dropped off their resumes along with everyone else), it was fine.

If you were wanted, you knew. If you weren't, you made sure to keep in touch to build a grapevine.

Microsoft has done this king of thing before. They used to offer Office at over 90% discount to students. No point trying to charge them money they don't have, they will just pirate. Microsoft found a way to turn them into paying customers, which is better than nothing.

More than 90%. I think my dad got a copy of Office 2010 for $10 when his company did a massive infrastructure upgrade and upgraded their entire system.

The goal is strictly marketing - if you convince people to use Windows, they'll probably stick with Windows. You may not get much money out of them, but there are long term issues to worry about - namely, platform support. If you want developers to write for your platform, you need to convince them that your platform is worth writing for. If a Chinese user is forced to choose between Windows and Linux, and they start going Linux, it hurts Windows because developers might start writing for Linux instead.

Microsoft had to lose the mobile battle to figure that part out - that it's no longer "if you build it, they will come." You have to convince them to come.

Windows is under constant threat - even Microsoft itself is hurting it through competition (i.e., Xbox) removing a reason to use Windows.

If they can convince people to stick with Windows, they're more likely to stick with Windows and Office in the long run.

Ask Microsoft how much HP pays them for the Windows license on the Stream 7 tablet ($100 tablet)? It's basically zip. Nada. Microsoft is basically giving away Windows licenses to super-cheap tablets to compete with Android. (Not that I mind, I have an iPad, but picked up a Stream 7, basically because it's a full PC for $100. It's no screamer, but for $100, it's pretty neat that you have access to everything on the desktop, including Steam, a bunch of ancient Windows 3.1 apps I use, etc.)