Titanium dioxide is only effective as a photocatalyst if you use very small particles (tens of nanometers in diameter) of the anatase phase. Rutile, the most common naturally-occurring phase, is a very inefficient photocatalyst, and that's what you would find in conventional white paint. You could use anatase nanoparticles as your pigment instead, but it would add to the cost, and it's not readily available for this level of consumption.

That's the wrong patent application. The author (who doesn't seem to understand patent law) linked to another application by the same inventor. The correct publication is here.

The first claim in the application (which may or may not be the one that will appear in the actual patent, though it's probably pretty close) is very specific. It requires, among other things, that "each user device [have] a local database and an application for... sharing desktop resources," and that "the information and the application services being delivered to the users are based upon knowledge of relevant experts." I don't see how you could argue that Twitter infringes here, and it definitely doesn't address messaging or chatting in general.

Micro-brewers and home-brewers all seem to think the secret to great beer is more hops. I can't remember the last time I had a micro-brew that wasn't too bitter to drink.

No. It's only considered prior art if it's offered for sale in the U.S. more than 1 year before the filing date. See 35 USC 102(b). This has nothing to do with a provisional application.

In my experience, the more often I teach a particular lecture, the smoother and more effective it will be. Forcing someone to change a lecture because the students expect it is unreasonable. Granted, some changes are simple (PowerPoint instead of overhead slides, lecture video available for download, electronic copies of handouts, etc.), but really, a halfway decent lecturer will understand where improvements can be made, and no amount of technology will make a bad teacher much better.

Besides, anyone who thinks college courses are intended to prepare you for the real world either never went to college or never had a real job.

My iPhone dropped about 12 inches, if that, to a sidewalk, and the screen shattered. It looked like I'd hit it with a hammer. I caught a ride to the airport from family for an early flight, and fell asleep in the passenger seat. The phone slipped out of my pants pocket, and when I opened the door to get out it fell and hit the sidewalk.

AT&T has a 30 day warranty on the iPhone. Anything beyond that, you're out of luck and you have to talk to Apple. I'd had the phone for maybe 3-4 days beyond that period. AT&T refused to do anything. I went to the Genius Bar at an Apple store, and they told me that, gosh, it's safety glass. It's not supposed to break like that. I said, "And yet..." They told me to talk to AT&T and see if they'd do anything. I got the sense that since I didn't buy Applecare, they didn't give a shit about me. I loved my iPhone, but the royal buttfucking Apple gave me over a product that they as much as admitted to me was defective completely took away any of the respect I had for their brand. The only Apple product I might consider buying now is an iMac, because I'm a musician. When I get one, I'll be getting it used, and Apple won't see a dime of my money.

Apple has jumped the shark as a company, and no longer feel like they have any responsibility to their customers. Pull the wool off your eyes and realize they're like any other big corp.

I knew we should have installed a factory reset button on the internet.

I keep thinking about the parallels of this with the older digital media of hand-copied books. Computers are much better than humans at copying data exactly, but much worse at understanding data once a small part of it has been corrupted.

We don't have to trust one neurotic monk anymore, but it's still possible for small corruptions to leak in. I wonder which has better data integrity: paintings inside a dark, windless cave, or a bunch of computers yelling ON and OFF at each other.

about so many groups using the same toolkit is that if you find a weakness in the toolkit then you can clear up multiple attacks all at once.

I'm not going to presuppose what Exxon knows or thinks -- but this is called hedging your bets. Aside from maybe being pathological, it's completely rational to fund both a "debunk global warming" campaign and a "deal with global warming" program, especially if the latter stands to earn you money. (Hell, they're just companies. They don't really care if in the future they can't sell oil, as long as by then they have a bigger revenue stream.)

There's no need to qualify that with "geological". It's absurdly hard to get an experiment to give you "pure", accurate results. Real world data is an exercise in pain.

any third party means anyone

so the cool diablo 3 background is not a piece of art?

drawings, paintings, sculptures are more present in your daily life, than you think. even if they are painted for promotion, they do have to be painted or be drawn - and get paid for.

also, painting with a digital stick to draw a digital image compared to an oilpainting is only different, because digital sticks are still new.

you are right about your differentiation between investor and sponsor, however it is not true, that paintings, sculptures are not made for money, as it is not true, that games/video/music is made for money only.

A while back I tried to start a trend by tagging such stories with "pimpmyblog", but it never really caught on.