I know I'm going to get flamed to hell and back for this, but I contend that none of these shows are *real* science fiction. I've long argued that even Star Wars isn't science fiction, and that's kind of why I hate it. The main conflict in any science fiction story should arise from, y'know, science. Not whiny politicians pondering who they should attack next or who will attack them next. You could pretty much replace the Death Star with gunpowder, the Millennium Falcon with a sailboat, and the evil Empire with some sort of old timey monarchy, and you pretty much have the same fundamental story. The same kind of replacement trick is a little harder with something like nanotechnology and the grey goop scenario (though certainly not impossible), giving it much stronger leg to stand on as 'science fiction. So perhaps 'scifi' writers should STOP RECYCLING STORIES WE'VE ALREADY SEEN BEFORE!

That active denial system sounds eerily like the thermal discouragement beam...

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yFRbGppLaUI

FoOd fOr ThOUghT.

They're all preachy-preachy about open standards, but when it comes to *their* products, they mangle them entirely. Take IMAP (Gmail) and CalDAV (Google Calendar), for example. In both cases, The Big G decided to "adopt" the currently in-place standard, with a few modifications because they feel it wasn't done quite right. The end result is a crap experience when you use the services in anything other than a web browser.

Perhaps a more feasible method (in the same vein you're thinking of) is to use a breeder reactor to generate new quantities of radioisotopes that emit He faster than what is found in the ground.

The car you currently own still beats out either of these by a significant margin.

Doesn't the world typically use A4 paper instead of 8.5x11?

"...despite fears that the move marks another stage in the militarisation of cyberspace." Isn't that totally a tautology? "The military using the internet marks another stage in the militarization of cyberspace! Egad!" Um, duh. I'd be more concerned with the consequences of militarizing cyberspace, than with the fact that cyberspace is being militarized.

Ubuntu with gfortran and vim. Really, what more do you need for science?

I'm finding more and more that whenever I hear things like 'Any program — good or bad — that wants to be active in RAM has no choice but to take up some space in RAM. At least one byte.' I immediately think "yeah, until they change/patch/fix/rewrite/figure a way around that."

Some would argue you don't need to, either...