That is because Republicans are out doing things. Mainly crazy things that can be made fun of. Democrats are not doing much of anything. Sure they don't get made fun of- but they also aren't doing anything to run the country.

Incorrect.

You are right that books are cheap to make (~10% of the cover), and distribute (another ~10%) but the writer only gets around 15%. The retailer gets ~40% of the cover price, and the rest goes to the publisher.

In other words, the business around writing gets more than the writers do.

Coward, most of the time (unless it is a big name writer) the person doing the marketing is the author themselves.

Thank you for proving my point. Every bit of current geo-engineering has been done by mistake. And for every idea about intentional geo-engineering, none have been tested adequately and all of them have potentially large negative side effects. Real geo-engineering would know what the outcome will be with a high degree of certainty. So we do not know how to do that yet. As you suggest we might be able to do that in 50 years. But then they thought we would have weather forecasting licked 50 years ago as well.

For space travel, the mechanics are known. Go that way as fast as possible. The aspects about identifying materials that can withstand the stresses is still unknown, but that is design rather than the total science. Intentional and stable geo-engineering is currently guesswork. Space travel science is known- it is just ahead of the material capabilities available.

And why are you assuming that thousands of people would be sent out in a ship? Or for that matter it can't be both geo-engineering and people? A robotic ship loaded with viruses, alien algae, alien insects, and alien seeds would be how any geo-engineering would need to start. That could be far worse for us than a ship full of sentients.

Geo-engineering a planet is far easier than traveling to another star.

Are you speaking from personal experience in these technologies?

Keep in mind, we have an understanding on how to reach another star, but are still working out how to geoengineer our own planet.

I think it is mistaken on some of the details. A solar sail works by being pushed by photons, just as a regular sail works by being pushed by the wind. A solar panel collects light and turns it into electricity. And solar panels are much thicker than a human hair. I don't doubt that it does have some solar panels but doubt it is as much as the article seems to imply since the panels are still much weightier than a solar sail needs to be.

I know CSI is just a TV show, but why can't real life be more like that, where they actually find real physical evidence to convict people?

The answer is in the question. CSI is a TV show with an only passing relationship to reality. Or do you really think every digital camera image can be magnified 100 times to reveal detailed information? Or that DNA is always 100% accurate and can be obtained in nearly every situation? Or that an entire crime scene can have every bit of evidence collected and sorted in a few hours?

CSI and other similar shows are making it harder to get convictions because juries think that it is realistic to get perfect and exact data all the time. The reality is that life is rarely that clean and precise.

>Someone who is banned for recommending AdBlock is presuambly running AdBlock, so how do they contribute to ad revenue?

Network effect. They are still using the site and contributing to the forums, which in turn draws more people to read and reply to comments in the discussions. They personally might not make money for the site since they block ads, but by contributing content to the site, they give other people not blocking ads content to read and return for.

Funny- I thought it was the grandparent poster who jumped ship based on a single issue. The parent poster just highlighted that the other popular political parties are not blameless in the financial crisis.

It isn't that the political beliefs are beneath him- it is that his understanding of policies and their consequences is.

Why should Hulu add more commercials? If they are viable as it is, wht do they care for Neilson? Neilson is there to help sell ads by giving a value to TV shows. If Hulu doesn't need that many ads why should they annoy their viewers to help an unrelated service?

The important part of the trick is that you have to assume the email address is the same as the username and then compare the hashes of that name @yahoo.com, @hotmail.com, @gmail.com, and other popular email services. Because people that use those webmail addresses have never received spam before.

If any spammer did try this, I would expect them to be very pissed off to discover that after all that work they already had 99% or more of those addresses to begin with.

If your response is going to be "fuck you, I won't release at all" then just stop now because that is the wrong attitude. No one- let me repeat that, NO ONE has ever- let me repeat that part too- EVER made something that could not be copied if someone wanted to. There are people that pirate the design of entire fucking CARS to make money. If you make something good, it will be pirated. It happens to software, books, car designs, artwork, sculpture, music, movies, TV shows, and just about everything else made by people smarter than you and I squared.

If you want a guarantee that it won't be pirated by some asshole then never release anything. That will show 'em, won't it. Give the world one less thing to pirate.

Or if you want to do something that is not based on fear, make a good product and release it. Maybe it will make you money, maybe it won't. Deciding to do nothing definitely won't. The question is will you act based on what you think you can do, or what you are afraid someone you've never met will do?

Those really do suck, but at the same time the music didn't seem to be even the same style as the songs. Of course if you pick "reggae" for a Police song it will most likely suck.

Those songs were all written by great writers (well- maybe not the last one- I'm not familiar with his music, but I'll give him the benefit of the doubt) so naturally no computer program will recreate their music. The really good stuff can't be matched by even those who have talent. Expecting a computer program to recreate it is stupid.

This software is very far from professional quality. Ok- maybe I can see it replacing the music writers for the latest pop music, but then that is crap too. This is something for people to play around with. Not to make real music with. All these examples do is prove that.

Of course by the time it gets to a jury you are already out all the legal fees, possible jail time after being arrested, bail, and the enjoyment of your neighbors, family, and coworkers all being interviewed by the police to see if you are a pedophile, as well as possible news coverage of the trial.

There have been many cases of "helpful" employees at film development shops turning in people to the police for taking such photos in to be developed. And then those people having their lives turned upside down defending themselves against child pornography charges.