The Golden Path endures.

I'm curious to know what the process is for cracking a game - what do crackers usually have to do to find what the game is requiring for activation? Anyone out there with experience that would care to enlighten myself and other interested readers?

His is the drill that will pierce the HIV-ens!

Yeah...nice work on this headline.

A lot of fundamental ideals of the USA are founded on the notion that what you have, make, or build belongs to you, and that you're entitled to the sweat of your brow with the overseeing government being entitled to only the bare minimum of it in order to provide public services and remain functional. Under that notion, you're free to do what you want with your property without fear or concern of it being subjected to the confiscation of the government for arbitrary reasons, simply because it feels entitled. What is yours is yours and can be distributed to friends, family, the poor, or whatever you wish. What the OP is arguing for is in defense of those kinds of ideals, to keep government hands out of private and individual pockets. Now, this notion has been adapted, adjusted, played with, tweaked, circumvented, or regarded as outdated in a "modern" society by numerous others of the last several generations, but the original intent and arguments still stand. Whether they bear further scrutiny or discussion is another matter, but that's the heart of why the estate tax is believed to be ridiculous by some.

Must not be so high up there that the joke goes over your head :).

I'm curious - I'm following the releases, but was curious where and how the releases are occurring - did Snowden release huge archives to the web and they're slowly being sifted and sorted through by interested parties, or are these being slowly released by people holding what Snowden released?

What are the advantages of ceramic engines? This is the first I've heard of them, and it sounds interesting. I'm off to the Wiki, but insight appreciated!

It stands to reason that it makes a sound that no knows... Perhaps Joff-tchoff-tchoff-tchoffo-tchoffo-tchoff?

Uninformed question here, but do they post the designs and technologies in the rovers for the public, or are they classified to any extent? I would think that once you've built one rover, that you could build and deploy a dozen for not *too* much more extra cost. Do those designs enter the public domain once the mission is complete? It would be great to have a portfolio of existing technologies that have proven to work on lunar or Martian environments and mass produce them for launch.

Have you got any good readings you can recommend on the subject =)?

Not when you post as an AC ;)...

The desire to change the world, to make an impact, to work for yourself, to work with competent people and see ideas come to life have nothing to do with it, right?That's why they're prepared to *spend* $5B to reacquire the company they built. Money's a nice motivator and a great reward, but it is far, far from the only reason why someone might do something like this, especially with such a huge upfront investment. Come back when you've built something of your own.

Inquiring mind here, but are there any interesting gadgets or household revolutions that we foresee on the horizon, if this sort of tech is commonly available?

There's plenty of cases where a well-regulated monopoly performs better than independent competition, usually when there's a particular resource in question that needs to be exploited or perform at a consistent level, and plenty of circumstances arise where you'd rather that control not be a purely profit-driven organization.