You just reinvented futures, and how to earn money with them. See http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Futures_contract

The contract you are mentioning is like a futures contract. Futures contracts can be traded just like any other security on exchanges. AFAIK, there are no futures contracts in bitcoin, yet...

Yes. Now imagine 1500 used rods, totaling 250 metric tons of spent fuel, mixed with 200 brand new shiny unused ones, lying in a large pile of mikado in a damaged pool on bent supports 30 feet above the ground, partially cooled by seawater that is eating away the zirconium rod housing, and with the roof collapsed on top of it. What could possibly go wrong...?

Please read the entire article. They state explicitly that the 300 beta versions that are gonna be sent out in a month will have 4 buttons instead of a touchscreen. The one that ships in 2014 will have a screen instead. The display on the touchscreen will be overlayed on the TV as well, so you don't have to look at the screen if you don't want to. There is no reason to assume the screen won't be in color, that technology is more than mature.

The trackpad is clickable as well. touching it will bring up the selection screen briefly, but will not actually select something, for that you have to click.

If you allow trades only every 10 minutes instead of continuous, you will end up with a whole lot of additional problems, and the big players will take advantage of it again anyway. Let me explain.

First of all, the "price" of a security is the price at which the last transaction happened. Normal people like me and you consider this "the price" of that security if we want to buy it. Suppose you want to buy a security at a certain price. You give an order out, buy 10 shares at price X. If a sell order for shares at price X exists, these orders are matched up, and depending on the sizes of the orders, executed partly or completely. These order are public knowledge, and the order books are visible: I can see that there are 1000 shares bid at price X, 900 at X-1, 789 at X-2 etc..., The same for the ask, so many shares at X+1, X+2, and so on.

Several algorithms use this knowledge. If I want to buy a gigantic amount of a given stock at once, I will be forced to buy the 1000 shares that are offered at X, then the next 900 offered at X+1, etc., so I will end up paying way more than X on average. The final price paid will be "the" price of the security after my buying spree, and will be significantly higher than X.

Now how can you make this work with 10 minute trading intervals? Normal people can't find out the current "price", since the last transaction was 10 minutes ago. You could look at the bids and the offers, and their volumes, to get an idea of what the price might be in the next trading slot, but these bids and offers can be made and cancelled within milliseconds. If I bid X, and see an offer for X-1 appear, I can cancel my bid, and bid X-1. It would be stupid otherwise.

HFT firms will still run their algorithms, manipulating these orderbooks to steer the price, and putting in bids in the very last millisecond. It might end up being even more profitable for them, since all the "sheep" that cannot trade so fast, or god forbid, use a keyboard to enter trades, will be fleeced even more: Now you see an order come in, you quickly frontrun it and make one cent of gains (before someone else is able to react). In a 10 minute system, you see order coming in, and have plenty of time to manipulate and steer the price before the orders will be executed.

I'm a European living in the USA for half a year now. In Europe, I cook every day, usually with nothing but fresh vegetables, sometimes canned veggies, some herbs, and high-quality meat (no antibiotics or hormones are allowed in Europe). We bake our own bread, use olive oils and butter, drink plenty of wine, and generally feel healthy.

Here in the USA, some people don't even have a kitchen. The bread tastes horrible, spongy consistency and very sweet. People eat breakfasts that look more like dinner to me. Eating out 3 times a day seems the habit, not the exception. Go into a bar and everyone is chugging pint after pint of beer, often accompanied by liquor. My wife didn't want anything alcoholic, and she got a very confused look from the bartender, "so, a coke then?". People are walking around with large recipients of ultrasweet soda's or stuff that has to pass for coffee but tastes more like melted ice cream. The entire country smells like bacon. In Europe, people try to avoid eating fries more than once a week, here it is considered a vegetable, and I see people eating them twice a day.

I gained 30 pounds in 6 months here, and I know why. I also know that once I am back in Europe I will lose all of it without any effort or ever going hungry. In fact, my body craves all the veggies I am currently not eating, and even thinking about a nice veggie soup or ratatouille, and then looking down to a supermcfatburger with extra everything makes me want to trow up.

It is very simple: If you, as a customer, buys an electronic device in the EU, and it malfunctions within 2 years, you are entitled to a free repair or replacement. There is no discussion possible. The store you bought it from has to take care of it, whether it is the manufacturer itself or some reseller. Its their problem.

Agree completely. I used to be a gaming addict back in the university days, mainly counterstrike and racing games, and these skills once almost saved my life. Driving to my parents house, we were on a busy road when the car in front of me had a collision and spun around. I could immediately respond, and avoided hitting it myself. My brother that was with me in the car was terrified, and didn't even realize what happened until we stood still much further. I am sure the gaming made the difference between an adrenaline-fueled insta-response, and a panic-driven "whathappens! whatdoIdo! crash!".

For IEEE journals, the pay for a reviewer is zero. As other people stated, it is considered part of the job, and an honor actually, since you are regarded an "expert" in the field.

Back in the days when I was young, you could smoke almost everywhere (Europe here), and nobody cared. There are still ashtrays in the trains and bathroom stalls at our university, however you cannot use them anymore (at least for their original purpose). Whenever someone got bored, they smoked. And put a bunch of smokers together, and they start chatting...

Helium-3 is used in neutron detectors. Very handy if you want to monitor whether your collider or neutron source is behaving well.

Here in Belgium it was in the news some weeks ago that delivering a baby was getting disgracefully expensive here, up to 1000 euros for normal delivery, and up to the outrageous sum of 1500 euro for a cesarean. This includes everything by the way, no really, everything.I guess it's all relative...

Here in Belgium, any degree in any university (bachelor or master level) costs around 500 euro tuition per year, for anyone. Additional costs are housing (around 250-300 euro a month for a room in a university dorm or in a shared house), food (subsidized by the university, a decent meal in the university restaurants costs around 3-4 euro's), and books (most courses are printed as a stack of A4 paper and distributed by the university itself, for only the cost of the paper). Of course there is the occasional prof that insists you buy book XYZ for 50-100 euro's, but that is rather rare, and generates a lot of complaining. There are almost no other costs.

Furthermore, if you are a "needy" student (e.g. your parents died when you were 17), the tuition is dropped entirely, you get almost free housing, and about 1100 euro's a month for living expenses (nothing of this needs to be paid back by the way). It is almost impossible to go into debt for your higher education here... By the way, anyone is welcome here, we have great beer, and still have a decent old-style education.

Unfortunately, this is for United States citizens only. Sounded like a nice project to give a try.

What would I have to do if I can solve all puzzles, but cannot claim the prize? Sell it to the Chinese?

Won't such a concentrated injection of hot air high in the sky generate a massive cloud cover right above the solar installation? Must be fun to fly in the neighborhood of these things with a glider though :)