Quite agree with the ethical argument, which is why I do neither.

However one huge difference between cattle and whales is the way that they kill them. A bolt to the head is not the slow death of an explosive harpoon. Average time to death for the last year of Norwegian whaling was 3 minutes, with the longest being 50 minutes.

http://whales7.tripod.com/policies/methods.html

There are many ways to hack a cell phone. It is a network connected computer FFS.

Like this one: http://techcrunch.com/2013/04/20/newly-discovered-android-malware-was-downloaded-millions-of-times/

I was at a security conference (AUScert) last year where a presenter talked about a crafted attack on St.George bank which involved malware on a persons PC, which prompted for a mobile phone number in a man in the browser attack, and then sent an SMS which exploited a weakness in the OS to compromise their mobile phone. It was truly scary stuff which told me:
a) do NOT underestimate the cunning of people that can make millions in a day or two through a carefully planned attack
b) be grateful that banks cover the costs of fraud (in Australia at least, other countries may differ).

Too true. I once needed a password to connect to a mainframe, and all I had was the hash. On the off chance I googled the hash and got the password. And this was five years ago...

Ethos (EthosLab) who does Minecraft videos stated on his channel that he makes more money though youtube than he does on his day job. He does put up a video a day (and gets 250k+ views), which would probably equate to 4 hours work a day.

Depends on the game. Compare Minecraft LPs from Paul Soares and Ethos. They are completely different. The same would be true of any LP for any free world or RPG game, and would also apply to strategy videos for FPS.

The same can't be said for most platform games, or other games on rails though.

"You cannot be punished for something that only became illegal after the fact"

Tell that to the Australian government, who have done exactly that on more than one occasion.

http://www.ruleoflaw.org.au/campaigns/campaign-by-topic-area/retrospectivity/

I doubt that a minimum wage worker would lose 33% in taxes - if they do you have one of the highest taxing countries in the world my friend. Here in Australia you have to reach about $100k to get taxed at that level. A minimum wage earner on around $600 a week pays less than 10% tax.

And bear in mind our minimum wage is $15.90 for a 20 year old. I think yours is something south of $8 dollars. AND our dollar is worth more than yours.

Chances are the painted snipe (or whatever) was going extinct anyway. Most species do.

I am quite green by inclination (I have a rural property and plant 200+ trees a year on it) but I can't help thinking that if a spider (or newt, or butterfly) has such a restricted range that a by-pass will wipe it out, well, we are just helping nature on a little bit.

The thing we humans have to make sure of though, is that we don't become like that spider (or newt, or butterfly). Keeping the planet habitable is in all of our interests. Which is why creating this legal fiction of a corporation that has the rights of people but none of the needs, is just plain insane.

That's right. We like to keep that cheap and nasty coal for our own power stations, like Hazelwood in Victoria (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hazelwood_Power_Station).

Not to mention the 1000 atomic weapons the US of A detonated in tests, many of the above ground. Of course the Chinese have 'sploded a few of their own, but not on the same scale...

And that is both the natural evolution of a emerging economy and a *good thing*.

Just look at what South Korea and Japan have contributed to the world by going through that process. And then times it by ten.

The really interesting thing is that China will not really have anywhere to outsource to once it gets to expensive to hire their own people. So naturally they will have to turn to robots.

You pay proper wages in the states? Is that why people have to have two jobs just to eat?

To North Americans maybe. To the rest of the world?

If they kill both of them I can guarantee it won't be in the news in ten days time.

Beer and circuses. Terrorist events have degenerated into a form of mass entertainment to keep us all distracted from the fact that we are all being kept in slavery by a global elite. Who would have thought it?

Stop whining and move if it is that important.

Just like saying the metro line is too far from where I live.

I have two VW Golf's here in Australia and both are set to report +6km/h at 110. I don't know how that scales at slower speeds. As a result I always set my cruise at 115 - 120 and have never been stopped by cops while on cruise, nor snapped by speed cameras. That goes for NSW, Queensland and the ACT.

The two times I have been snagged for speeding have been in little villages on country highways that suddenly go down from 100 to 60 or 50. Do 5km over the limit and they will have you.

It also varies by state. Victoria used to be the worst, even having helicopters for those open stretches of road.