Nova aired an NHK look at some of the survivors / victims that were seen on the various cell phone etc. videos right after the tsunami. Turns out, a fair bit of the people who got caught were unaware because they were doing something where they didn't hear the radio, the sirens, and didn't see the locals run for the hills. It would be time to consider other ways of notifying the population, maybe cell-phone based stuff?

I read (http://www.rapidcityjournal.com/news/article_224526f0-9af5-11e0-84b8-001cc4c03286.html) that some of the main drivers for the elevated water levels were the shipping and fishing industry that lobbied their demands into the manual. Oddly enough, I suppose the fishing and tourism industry have largely similar interest as the "environmentalists" as far as the water levels. Still, original sounds indeed like conservative propaganda being propagated on people's misery.

Don't forget that teaching pays even less. So, the good engineers get wise and get out of engineering into finance, law, etc. The middling engineers put up with what's available. The ones that can't get other jobs end up teaching the next generation.

Now, before the flaming starts, that's a gross overgeneralization, I know. But the fact is that teaching of the next generation of scientists and engineers is about the worst paying job a well educated one can have in those disciplines, and the good people in it see it as a calling.

Part of the reason Finland's education system (through which I went) was so good was that your STEM teachers (ditto for foreign language) in middle/high school typically had a full master's in their discipline plus education studies, and they were paid enough to make this a worthwhile endeavor.

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Kind of ironic, actually, that the geek news site has geek news about a geek event, but no indications of participating.

The problems in a lot of IT shops are that instead of training people to troubleshoot Dells (or HP, or Lenovo, or Apple), getting them the diagnostics, spare parts and warranty procedures for a few models, and site licensing software for one architecture, you now have to get people to troubleshoot fifty different kind of hardware, drivers, antivirus, patches, license all the software for Mac / Windows / Linux etc. It's certainly doable, and in some environments there's certainly a business case for it, but it means multiplying the size of the support staff, which costs a lot of money -- or putting up with the kind of ad-hoc support that existed before standard PXE boot images, in-stock spares, test-to-work standard hardware/OS/applications.

And that's the part I don't understand: I really like the Nordic/European model where your usage is unlimited, but you get a speed cap determined by how much you pay. In the US everyone gets full speed for the first half day, and then either gets cut off or has to pay ridiculous overage charges. You'd think at least one carrier in the US would get with the program and start selling unlimited use but limited speed plans.

I live in a pretty large town with several colleges, and know of zero independent new book stores, and one used one. Borders closed all their stores in town, but there's a B&N and Books a Million left, but it's really hard to find books I like in either. Bottom line is, I don't really have an alternative to Amazon for the books I buy.

I've used mine in Narita (airport and town), Tokyo, Kyoto, Nara and Uji, so coverage isn't horrid, but presumably follows 3G coverage.

Actually, if you have a 3G/UMTS phone that uses normal international frequencies, they now work in Japan as well. I've used a Nokia E61, Sony-Ericsson K600i and will be taking my N8 with me on the next trip. Also, T-Mobile had much better (still exorbitant, though) international roaming rates.

Really? People on the NANOG list from late February claim the developer copies do not have it. Having Apple officially announce this would be awesome, can you provide a link or documentation?