Yeah i had AOKP on my last phone. Sadly, I needed to install a remote access app from my employer on my new one and it won't run on a rooted phone.

This insistence that everything is in the 'cloud' is getting really old, particularly with Android. There are occasions dear Google when someone is offline. I don't want to have to store my Earth KML files on Drive to view on mobile Earth app. I don't want to have to connect my android phone via USB to copy or move things around on my SD card. I don't want to have to print over the internet. Whatever networked fantasy land you live in at GoogleHQ, is not reality. If I wanted to be restricted to what I could do with my devices "for my own good", I'd go back to the iPhone. You are rapidly chipping away at my reasons for switching to Android.

Was Hobbit perfect? No, of course not. However, it could have been much, much worse. I'll point you to the epic ruination of Starship Troopers or the somewhat lesser mangling of Ender's Game or the utter crap fest of Battlefield Earth (strip out the thinly disguised Scientology elements and you still have the bones of a good story). These are books I grew up with and I felt real excitement knowing they would finally be movies... Then I saw the movies...

For all the purists that think every line of dialog should be preserved to properly honor J.R.R. I'd like to mention Dune. I've worn out copies of this book. I've got just about every version available of the David Lynch movie. However, I said for a long time that I wish that movie had more from the book and was more faithful. Then I got the Dune mini-series on SciFi channel. It was chock full of hours and hours of dialog. You know what? I can't stand it, it's just boring. Books and movies are different media and just blindly spamming straight from the book does not make an engaging movie.

Had Peter Jackson made the LOTR movie purists wanted, it would have flopped and you wouldn't have gotten The Hobbit at all. Had he made the first Hobbit movie the way purists wanted, we might not have gotten the end of the story (see Battlefield Earth, it's abysmal failure doomed the second movie intended to actually finish the story).

Hey, if you don't like the movies, that's fine. Everyone gets an opinion. However, given the Hollywood track record with adaptations of Sci-Fi/Fantasy, and the need for them to make movies with as broad of an appeal as possible, I think that we actually got far better than we could have expected...

did anyone find themselves reading the summary in the Stephen Hawking machine voice? Every time his name comes up, I hear the voice.

"a failed justice system"

Show me the failure here... The grand jury found no probably cause to proceed. That's the way the system works, all available evidence is reviewed and a decision is made. Remember that whole 'innocent until proven guilty" bit? Also, show me where burning down your neighbors home/car/business makes any point other than that you are a lawless punk. Hey, next time I get really mad about something, why don't I go burn your neighborhood down, that should really get you on my side...

"We're not asking for perfect. We're asking for better"

You must live under a rock... The mindset in the USA these days from local government all the way up to Federal level is that all solutions must be perfect solutions and make everyone happy. So...nothing really gets done. Some places do seem to buck this trend, but I see it more and more.

This is what happens when "moderate" or "center" become dirty words. We're getting a nation of extremists that refuse to compromise. It's pathetic and embarrassing.

"Right. Because they totally don't pay attention to anything else. You know, like how many houses, cars, or basketball teams he owns."

Finding those things out requires conversation... If she says "thanks for the drink, I was just leaving" at the the first sight of your baldness, how will you get to that point? Assuming your idea of casual conversation does not involve screaming "I HAVE N HOUSES!!!" at her back as she walks away, of course...

given that after 7 years they have yet to release a conclusion to the cliffhanger ending of Ep. 2 for one of the biggest games ever developed is it any surprise that they won't be releasing SteamBox on time? I've long since stopped caring about Ep. 3 and I won't hold my breath for SteamBox. Even if it is released, will Valve ensure a steady supply of content for it?

"Getting to orbit is a lot harder, yes; but that's an actual achievement, instead of a publicity stunt. You can actually do useful stuff once you're in orbit. You can't do that from a jumped-up fairground ride."

You mean useful like going in speedy circles around the planet for 50 years? Or useful like building a giant space station for 3 or 4 people to go around in speedy circles after the bus has left? What marvelous uses!
Those newfangled aeroplanes were quite the jumped-up fairground ride in their early days as well.

"Innovation is always built on the back of others"

But when it's Apple, it's just a logical progression of technology. When it's some other company, it's all rape and pillage. double standards are fun.

Today's fish is Trout a la Creme!

"If that were the case, then you'd expect them to think the older, more valuable one sounded better right away, not the newer, less special one; so this seems to be a statement against confirmation bias."

Nahhhh. after spending a million bucks and being underwhelmed they do what anyone with buyers remorse does...they start imagining things.

dark matter is the aether! they were right all along, take that Einstein!!!!

HA! Funny to think that somehow there was 1 extra atom of matter and that made all the difference in which one dominated.

nah... probably Celcius...