Less than a year ago we had a piece of laboratory equipment die due to the hardware of the controller PC. After guessing about the probable failure rates of various options, we purchased a new version of the instrument. The instrument arrived with a new controller PC with WinXP installed on it. The installer then told me how his company had to really work to find a copy of WinXP for the system.

So the plan of upgrading out of WinXP will only work once all hardware vendors no longer have access to copies and instrumentation suppliers stop being able to get copies.

There has to be a way to make this statement more clearly. The less coupled with the NOT is too close to multiple negatives for my lightning fast reads. "This would mean that there was even less of Ubuntu that was NOT shaped and polished by folk other than Canonical â" a move that one would think would be well received."

I forget, but why does California law matter in this context? Is ICANN in California?

There was once a show on Comedy Central focusing on a guy that would run scams.

In one he got his home cleaned for free by posting an advertisement for lingerie models for a calendar for an equestrian magazine. When the girls showed up he had them pose with cleaning supplies and “pretend” to clean. It took him all day, but his house was clean for free.

He explained that he chose an equestrian magazine so that it would send up a red flag and eliminate all of the smart people that would cause trouble.

The show may have only aired that one episode.

If the Germans are announcing this, I can imply that many governments have just such an organization. I don't think my 1337 skills are up to the task of fighting off actual armies.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Declaration_of_war_by_the_United_States War of 1812, Mexian-American War, Spanish-American War, World War I, World War II. Others were authorized by Congress, the UN, and of course we had some undeclaired wars.

Didn't we "win" some of those. At least the last 3 in your list.

Reminds me of an old Dan's Data http://www.dansdata.com/gz039.htm. At some point he discusses ferroresonant power conditioners. Presumably one can get a whole house version. Warning: I am operating from memory, I didn't actually read the article again.

Can't we just put laser filters on the cockpit windows (or have the pilots wear laser safety glasses)? Maybe we can't filter *every* color laser (that may block too much normal light), but we could filter the green ones which the article mentions as the more troublesome type.

Charged not convicted. His defence team hasn't started to play yet.

There seems to be a concerted effort to make the government as useless as possible.

Pardus is an entertaining game. One could play for long stretches avoiding most other players.
If one joined a strong faction, one could stay within their territory, working for the "man" and have a good time. Unfortunately, it is a game with a limited number of "moves" per day.

Anyone else get all excited to see games they used to play in scientific papers? If I had known I could have published on it, I would have played more during grad school.

I have heard, but do not have a reputable source, that the overhead on NASA projects is 500%.
For those who do not know, budgets for academia and government work are calculated roughly as:
Actual Costs * Overhead = Budget
The Overhead goes to things like facilities, accounting, IT, etc.
Actual Costs include salaries (possible benefits), parts and supplies.
The Universities I have worked for have overheads around 50%.

The police report of your stolen computer should do a fine job of showing that you are not guilty of the infringing.

you sign up and are lazy and just go about posting stuff without thinking of any consequences.

there may be some need or times like causes when you want as much info about you up there.
I have little to hide but i have ONLY put up my birthdate and location , seriously strangers come to the door i have a 350 pound security guard thats gonna tell you about how privacy works

( will i get to post again?)