That seems rather high for a simple gallon of clean, frozen water bits in bulk. I'm gonna say maybe it's your region or something else every accountant at every fast food place is an idiot cause they always fill it up with ice, many even having lines on the cups where employees are to fill to. In the case given of Sonic, they fill it completely full. I find it highly suspicious they would consistently do that with the most expensive part and would instead look to reduce costs, esp at a firm that has happy hours every day with half price drinks.

Water around here is something like 2.45 USD per 1000 gallons out of the tap. Add an ice machine which is basically a sunk cost and then periodically have filters changed, negligible, and electricity is only around 10 cents per kWh so I'd be curious to see those calculations.

TBH, those are fairly ugly. Seems there could be a market for disguising them just like they do some cell phone towers or simply having the city allow it to be put in spaces not out in the open.

Actually over 5 of 10 are obese according to the CDC (35.7% adults 17% kids). http://www.cdc.gov/obesity/data/facts.html So over half and yeah they are as common as people think, and that doesn't even count those that are simply overweight (and not obese) which is over 34% http://www.cdc.gov/nchs/fastats/overwt.htm. Added together, no matter what street corner you go to you will be surrounded by overweight and obese people which indeed *ARE* the norm. But I do agree with your other points.

If you really believe you got 64 oz of soda in that cup, then their marketing worked.

Granted if you fill it yourself you can add little or no ice, but for any to go cups where the store fills it, I think you'd be surprised at just how little drink is in the rather large cup when you take away all the (cheap filler) ice. Around here, Sonic is the worst. A 'Route 44' big drink is really only a little more than a 12oz soda can in a bucket of ice.

Sorry, unless it's a high school student coming up with this for a science fair, Slashdot isn't interested.

I only keep it so I can get unlimited photo storage instead of the paltry amount they give you with Picasa web albums.

Would rather have an add-on box that had these features so I don't need a new tv and will work with anything out there. Why would anyone buy a TV with such integrated, limited features when they will be outdated long before the TV is?

Give me a marginally smart tv (net capable, some apps), and then anything else let a standalone and easily replaceable box be added, sort of like, I don't know, the current AppleTV?

I'm not an Xbox owner but always a potential customer. Is Xbox Live required or can you just play all your games and movies like normal and it is only for online play? I'm assuming certain games require it (MW3? COD?) b/c of their nature of online play, or at least part of the game would if they have a stand alone single player campaign.

Does this version of the Xbox come with wifi built in? I thought I remember a while ago dongles for sale since it initially didn't have it?

With 2 younguns and a couple DS's, iPod/Pad, and a Wii, I'm still not sure the $99 would be worth it for our household/usage. And from what I've seen of my relatives use of the Kinect sensor I think I'll pass. Though it might be fun to play with for some 3D modeling and such.

For my personal usage, the only reason I still use it is at work it's nice to have Live Bookmarks. Seeing the RSS feed titles without having to use yet another service to manage is great. But I'd have switched completely to Chrome earlier if it wasn't for this. Now all my installs and managed pc's run Chrome. It's just so much easier and simpler, esp when the client is already in the Google domain.

But it's a paid for service! No. Just No.