typo in summary

Do I really need to spell this out for you? I'll give you a hint. It rhymes with corn. It is also the most common answer to any question having to do with the internet.

My wife says, "Men are waffles. Women are spaghetti." But as for Wikipedia not lending itself to flow, you've never played the random walk game. Start on a Wikipedia page, click the nth link on that page. Say the third link that's not a pronunciation or disambiguation link. Go from there. You'll be surprised how you can go from Pokemon to Pipe Organs in the same walk. [citation needed]

I think it's a fun way to waste a lunch hour when there's not good articles on /.

Sounds like a bad Wikipedian did not follow some basic rules: Assume good faith (AGF); Please do not bite the newcomers (BITE); No personal attacks (NPA). These are very important, and your example illustrates why.

Allow me to apologize on behalf of my fellow Wikipedians. We police this sort of behavior as much as we can, but it becomes tiresome. We have lost many good editors over the years because of crap like this. It's sad.

but... I thought we were never supposed to talk to the cops?

Damn. I wish my wife would let me do that. My 3yo girl can scream loud enough to make ears bleed. And my eldest is a question a second. I should just hand him the phone, and say, "hey, this guy wants you to tell him all about Minecraft, Rainbow Loom, and Pokemon!!"

I had a Nigerian coworker who was stunned (nearly offended) to find out that the rest of the world refers to it as a 419 scam. She then showed me a video of a crowd of people stoning an accused thief to death, while the police watched unable to stop it. So.... I guess she didn't call HR on me. :-)

Except the Stasi would not have had the capability to sift through 8 billion records, much less 850B. That's what's even scarier, they can search through this stuff so fast. In all the shit I've written over the years, I'm sure there's something to indict me on. And I'm a pretty clean-cut guy.

'Sheriff flyneye, this is special agent Fredricks wanting to verify your login credentials for ICREACH. Our database shows that you still have the default password of "Password1" which should be changed immediately. ... Oh, OK. ... "kitty69"? ... Yes, that's acceptable. Sorry for the confusion.'

While I don't agree with you, I think it's improper that you have been modded troll. It is not trolling to expound an unpopular idea. You have some valid concerns that some of the arguments made in favor of NN could later be used to legitimize a second round of SOPA/PIPA style legislation. They've tried it before, and if we do not remain vigilant, they will certainly try again.

But I believe that the risks of gatekeepers like Comcast intentionally dicking with who gets to see what how fast. If we had true competition, I could get behind the libertarian ideals of "don't regulate companies too much." But in this instance, you get only one, maybe two if you're lucky, providers of high-speed DSL in an area. And in many areas, these guys are also the cable providers. Hell, mine even has it in the name: Consolidated. They are intentionally consolidating services. They claim it is to improve customer experience, but it's pretty obvious that their goal is jacking up rates as high as they can get away with.

Internet access (like the airwaves) is clearly an area where the risks of not regulating enough outweigh the risks of over-regulation. I think that corporations in America have proven time and again that they are worthy of even LESS trust than the bozos in DC. Especially in the case of an open and free Internet. It's not "What could go wrong?" It's "What is already going wrong?" Just look at the whole Netflix/Comcast protection racket if you have any doubts.

So wait... it's OK if it blows up in Phoenix, but not in San Diego? Not sure I understand the logic of rerouting the flight.

That's only part of the story. The forum is where all the real action was/is. There was/is a religion of sorts. Complete with popes, prophets and pilgrimages. And lingo. (Chirping mustard! The OTT is seaish. and cancercoffeesemenbabies). I assume it is still going, but I refuse to check. I lost a lot of time in that forum, and I had to make a clean break. There were many people whose RL relationships were strained because of this. People were up every hour checking the latest ONG. For those of you willing to go down the rabbit hole, you will want to read the thread from the beginning. That is called blizting. You will be encouraged along your way, and encounter many strange and wonderful things. Randallspeed.

Maybe not?

I'm not entirely sure how this got modded insightful. The patent system is certainly not built upon owning an idea. They cover a particular implementation, a certain solution to a problem, not just an idea. If you invent a machine that makes unicorn farts, you can patent that machine. If I make a unicorn fart machine that operates in a different way, I am free to do so. Now the market has two different unicorn fart machine styles, and we are arguably better off as a society.

As an engineer with some hands on experience filing and working around patents, I can honestly say that a large part of the patent system still works as intended. I believe inventors should be protected, especially when it's a David and Goliath situation, and patents still offer some of that protection. I also believe that the patent system encourages inventors in at least two ways. It lets you know that there is at least one solution to your problem, and that somebody thought it was worthwhile enough to patent it. It also forces an inventor to be more creative and come up with different solutions to the problem than what has already been done. Sometimes when you have to think of a different solution, you end up with a better solution.

That being said, I think business method patents are stupid, and that software patents are evil. And if you're going to file a patent on something, you sure as shit better not try to sue me on "trade secret" grounds. (yes, that actually happens)

What about when the press uses a quad copter with a camera to go behind the gates of a company doing something nasty, or a wealthy politician's compound where something illegal is going on? Seems like this would make it harder for whistle-blowers to do their thing.