Translation: translate.google.com works as well as anything. The only real limitation is that technical jargon in German doesn't pass through to an equivalent US English expression. But that is the same thing that happens when German people speak English. They have very good grammar and accent in English, but they are not taught our technical words or colloquialisms. So technical documents have a lot of instances of "Module", "Technology", etc. referring to different things using the same words when there were more specific words that meant something in German.

Disclaimer: I'm a translator by trade.

That said, I think for basic, oral communication, a lot can already be done, but for anything beyond that, anything out there right now fails miserably.

It's not just about translating words. Consider, say, translating a legal document from any language to English. Which English, exactly? Not only are legal terms different depending on country, but so are legal concepts. Even within the same region, you'll find variation of speech that currently can't be handled at all with automatic translation. Ever read the transcript of a message left on Google Voice by a non-standard American English speaker? It's laughable. Translation knows nothing about these differences.

We're going to need humans specialised in specific concepts and regions for a long time.

So I take it your employer gives you equal time out of the office to accomplish this? If not, it doesn't sound like a solution, just more of a time-suck.

Epiphany is Jan 6, 12 days after Christmas.

Did he not know that he could choose the background image? Or that he could edit it? It came out the way it did because he just clicked away without thinking.

Sorry for his daughter's death, but he could have influenced the final result or, better yet, elected to not participate in it at all.

I'm not sure how much "Selma" and "American Sniper" cost to produce/market/release, but there's been a lot of news blurbs stating that "The Interview" cost around 80 million to put out, around 30 million of that just on marketing.

They still have a long way to go to break even, even with Hollywood's underhanded accounting.

I'm much more interested in what Jolla may come out with. Their OS interests me, and for those android apps I'd need (none of them need Google Play), I'd imagine they'll have it ready to run them.

From their crowdfunding promo that I saw a month or so ago, it looks like it'll be expensive, though.

I'm just over the border in Wisconsin and CenturyLink is my only wired choice too. They supposedly give us a 2M down/768K up connection, but I never have seen it. And they keep telling us that upgrades will be coming soon. They're actually not taking any more subscribers right now, due to saturation.

So I ended up getting rid of CL and just using a small hotspot for casual browsing. My neighbor does let me still use his CL connection via WiFi when I want to do anything big (like ISOs, and videos) though. Otherwise, my little 3G hotspot is actually faster than CenturyLink.

Or better yet, get something like a Viliv or a BenQ. They have relatively modern Intel processors, so you can install most any Linux on them, provided you can find the drivers.

I have a BenQ. I have Opera 12 running on it, and just recently installed Softmaker Office (they recently released their 2012 suite as free) so I have a very capable office suite. With a foldable BT keyboard, it' s WAY more useful than any smartphone is, although if I could find a decent enough office suite for Android, I' d opt for a cheap tablet.

in the comments.

Do you have an indian reservation nearby? I have two near me and I've seen the same IT positions (a DB admin and a sys admin) available for the last two years for one place.

Now, I can't speak with any authority, but reservations around here operate as sovereign territory and don't play by the same local/state/national rules. So it could be that a past felony might be OK. It's also entirely possible that they would reject you because of your felony, but it's an option worth checking.

Or on a Bart platform.

I try to keep a decent handle on what I use, at least when it comes to a cellular hotspot I use.

One tool I use with a laptop (but it could easily be installed on a Linux or BSD-based router, is VNStat - humdi.net/vnstat/

It can monitor and report hourly, daily, monthly, etc and you can easily chose what interface to report (it monitors all active interfaces). There's also some graphics reporting capability, too, but I just use the command line output and awk-parse what I need.

I lived in SF for decades, most of my adult life, in fact.

I'm not talking about acceptance. I'm talking about actual leadership. It's quite rare that an open homosexual is a CEO of a successful multinational corporation. In fact, I don't know of another, certainly not in the tech world.

True enough. But considering just how straight white male oriented the tech industry is, it's good to point out that occasionally we have other possibilities.

It truly won't be an issue when the tech industry is more aligned with the general population. We're not there yet.

I don't watch video over the internet in HD. A gig will provide me with about 4-4/12 hours of standard definition shows.

I'm in an extremely rural area. Cable is not an option. It's either satellite or a huge antenna that's capable of getting signals from over 100 miles away.

While it's expensive, I rely on cellular internet for everything and wireless connect through a router. There's not a single show I can't watch (that I want to, anyway) over the internet. Plus, sine I don't have a remote, I'm sort of forced to actively choose what it is I want to watch, rather than mindlessly clicking from channel to channel.

I don't miss cable at all.