... I apologize for my somewhat undiplomatic language, but the current wire payment system is a cluster-fuck of fail.

My company is based in Canada and accepts wire payments from Canada, the US, Europe, Australia, South Africa and the Middle East. Half the time, we see mysterious deposits appearing in our account without any useful identification. We ask our customers to specify invoice numbers when they make a payment. Sometimes that comes through. Mostly it does not. Sometimes we don't even get any indication as to who the money is from.

So then we need to phone our bank and they take days to track down who just paid us. It's a total nightmare.

I'd welcome wholeheartedly anything that can improve the situation.

Bush was spinning; it was all PR to avoid fanning the flames. But he was wrong. Islam is not peace; it is war by definition, since Muslims are commanded to convert non-Muslims by force.

the majority who peacefully practice that same religion

You cannot peacefully practice Islam. It is simply not possible. Islam divides the world into Muslims (dar al Islam) and non-Muslims (dar al harb, literally house of war) and Muslims are commanded to convert non-Muslims by force. This is a fundamental tenet of Islam.

Those millions of peacful Muslims we all hear about are simply choosing to ignore or rationalize away the parts of Islam they choose not to practice.

That is precisely the danger of Islam. The vile aspects of it appeal to the mentally ill and unstable and turn them into jihadis.

I'm not sure if BarbaraHudson is herself "t" in LGBTt, but perhaps she should study Islamic response to homosexuality and transgenderism before defending Islam.

What I find terrifying is how quickly supposedly intelligent people descend into clumping massive groups of people together and scream terrorist.

Look, Islam itself is quite objectively disgusting. There are so many horrible things in the religion that I don't really want to enumerate them here for you; just do a Google search.

The only reason most Muslims are not violent is that most Muslims reject or rationalize away the disgusting parts of Islam. However, the underlying vile philosophy persists and periodically infects the minds of vulnerable losers, turning them into jihadis. At some point, the Western world has to ask itself it can tolerate this dangerous ideology to spread within our societies or if we need to take proactive action ourselves to monitor what's being taught and expel those who preach extermism.

Most Muslims are peaceful, but Islam itself is a noxious brew of racism, hatred and barbarity. The only reason most Muslims are peaceful is that they're human enough to reject the horrible parts of their religion.

What's really needed is an Islamic reformation that purges the Qu'ran and other Islamic religious texts of all the disgusting passages. But that, alas, is blasphemy and will never happen. Instead, Islam will continue infecting vulnerable people and turning them into killers, just like some sort of infectious mental illnes.

I think a similar "market peak" will eventually occur with phones in the near future

I'm not sure about that. Apple is extremely good at driving people to buy new things as a fashion statement, even if the underlying technology is more-or-less the same. That's the problem: Consumer electronic goods are becoming fashion items and that's extremely bad for the environment.

As for another poster who wrote Shitty firmware and an abandoned or poorly supported product is a perfectly good reason to throw something out, well maybe. But I was talking about old, perfectly functional devices.

Yes, it's very trendy to get a new phone every year. And yes, it's fun to laugh at those neanderthals and troglodytes who have *gasp* last generation's iPod.

Now trace all those discarded electronics to their end-of-life graves and see how we're poisoning the environment with arsenic, plastics, cadmium and other toxic chemicals, all just to satisfy our craving for shiny things.

I would be proud to own a 12-year-old piece of electronic gear that still functions and does what I need. I have a five-year-old phone (Nokia N900) and bought my daughter's iPod third-hand for $30; it plays my music just fine. No plans to replace the phone or the iPod any time soon.

Yes, that whole model is flawed. SV may be making lots of money, but it's ruining people's lives if it expects insane work hours.

I work in the tech field (actually, I own a 10-person tech company) in Canada and I have never made my employees work overtime. Ever.

Unfortunately, given free reign, businesses will exploit employees and the labour laws in the US offer hardly any protection to workers.

No, I don't think Snowden gave the Russians much... that's why I said they've already got all they can. And the PR value diminishes daily; no-one cares about old news.

I expect Russia has already got everything out of Snowden that it ever will.

Actually, I do not rely on stories from the media, but on talking to Russian friends who have left Russia. Say what you like, but people vote with their feet... hence the huge flow of "enslaved" Americans into "free" Russia... yeah, that's it.

When all is said and done, the US is still a helluva lot freer than Russia. But I was being facetious; the last place he should go is the USA or we'd see a Snowden - Durov swap in the blink of an eye.

With Putin giving the US a black eye by harbouring Edward Snowden, maybe this guy will find sanctuary in the US? :)

Before you think about how to run your shop, ask these questions:

Do you have a product?

Is there a market for that product? How do you know?

Do you have a business plan including a marketing plan?

Once you get past those questions, the rest is easy. Outsource anything that doesn't make sense (HR, accounting, payroll) and keep your core expertise in-house. Don't obsess about coding standards, etc. until you have cash flow. It's far more important to do your utmost to get the business making money thatn to worry about programming minutiae.

I did start a software product business back in 2000 and it's going strong. The very first person I hired was our VP of Sales and Marketing. I didn't hire another technical person until employee #5, so didn't have to worry about imposing coding standards on others. :)