Actually, looks like quite thick walls on the pan; so the heat should conduct down to the liquid really quite well; having thick walls avoids that exact problem; and aluminium is a very, very good conductor of heat.

I dunno. Has Obama come out in favor of it yet?

What is your criterion for restricting the variations? Why are "Anonymous Coward" and "Anonymous Poster" possible, but not "XFFSF Poster" and GWB as an active Slashdot user?

Except in the one where you posted saying it wasn't, but were mistaken because it actually was. That might not be too far from the one where I'm GWB, a frequent Slashdot poster. It's interesting to ponder the concept of what "infinity" really means when you consider all the possibilities on some mundane thing like that.

If they want to go after a SEO company for not optimizing their search results, I don't see anything wrong with that. But has Seattle City Light considered just NOT SUCKING as a strategy to improve their reputation? Seems to me that analyzing the root cause of the problem ("Man, we REALLY suck!") and fixing it ("Hey, has anyone thought about maybe trying NOT sucking?") would be a good bit less expensive. Seems like only an idiot would say "Hey here's an idea! Let's pay 20 grand to some company and then we can keep sucking!" Of course, as a power company you kind of have a captive audience, so it seems like you could really suck all you want to as long as you don't capture the attention of various regulatory bodies in the process.

*shrug* I don't live in Seattle, so I don't know anything about it, but the internets say they suck pretty hard. I'm guessing their SEO company kind of sucks, too. Birds of a feather, eh?

The military application is that it is rumoured to be able to detect stealth aircraft.

If you don't want French money you're not obliged to take it.

If you do want French money then you obey French law.

If you think that Amazon are stupid enough to ignore the 9th largest economy in the world just because of some idiotic pseudo-religous worry about "free markets" I've got a bookshop to sell you.

Trojan Man?

You'd think not getting anthrax, smallpox and deadly bird flu would be a powerful incentive to follow the proper procedures to keep everything sanitary :-/

I suppose if upper management ignored the problem for long enough, it WOULD eventually sort itself out...

A silver lining to a yeast infection!

Another reply has already pointed out the "navigable airspace" limitation. The specific FAA rule is FAR Part 91.119 Minimum Safe Altitudes. Basically 500 feet everywhere, and 1,000 feet over "populated areas".

Back in 1981 the FAA addressed RC operators with Advisory Circular 91-57. It requires RC operators stay under 400', remain in line of sight, and coordinate with an airport if they are within 3 miles of the airport (which is where planes may be under those minimums due to take offs and landings.

This set of rules basically insures vertical separation of RC operators and "real" planes. It's worked for over 30 years, quite nicely. In fact the FAA is quite happy with this for "drone" (really RC quadcopter) operators. Buy one, fly it over your house within the rules, take a video and post it on YouTube for your "hobby" and the FAA is perfectly ok with it, and won't give you a hard time.

Rather, the FAA is drawing a different line here. They have a long history of distinguishing between commercial and private operations, and have different regulations for both. They have generally held in the past that "all commercial operators must be licensed", which in the context of real planes makes perfect sense. But with these new quadcopters this rule has gone screwy. If you take the same video from the last paragraph and provide it to your realtor to help sell your house, suddenly you are a "commercial" operator and can't operate without an FAA License, and oh by the way they have no procedure to license RC operators right now so you can't get one, but you can ask for a one off waver, it may be approved in a few months.

And that's what is stupid here. If it's a RC device, operated by a human, under 400' and in line of site, they should stay out of it. Commercial or hobby shouldn't matter.

I can't help but picture a sign on the door at the exit of an airport in Israel. It reads "Thank-you for not stirring up ancient inter-tribal conflict".

I think you're post will be as effective as such a hypothetical sign; but thanks for trying. X --+ (Don Quixote's lance and a windmill).

dead red laws

I see Virginia is listed. I wish there had been such a thing back in the 80s. I sat for what seemed like 5 minutes on rt. 50, waiting for a left turn arrow. It was mid-day so there was very little traffic (it's a parking lot during rush). I had at least 1/4 mile line of sight, maybe more. I honestly thought the signal was broken, and that's what I told the cop who was either behind me or camped under a tree where I didn't see him. There was no arguing on the spot, and it's the only time I ever went to traffic court, where the excuse didn't fly either. But hey, at least the 70 year old half-blind lady who caused an accident got to keep their license. I learned a lot of lessons that day.

To this day, I also wonder if that cop was dicking with the signals to make his quota.

It's not like you can't get the HIV again once you've been cured of it. Are we going to rule that out just because we don't want to think about how a 4 year old might contract HIV again after being cured of it?

I prefer this one.