If these foreign subsidiaries aren't "tax resident in any nation", are they protected by the laws of any nation? It seems odd that a company can exist and be recognized as an entity that can hold property without being incorporated in a recognized nation. Can't we just take their stuff and see who they turn to for the protection of law?

So were mobile phones. 20 years ago, anyone talking on a cellphone was assumed to be a jerk.

Yes, absolutely. However, it needs to be made clear that this is still the case despite the DMCA, hence the bill "makes clear that it is not a violation".

No, I'm interpreting your implications. Any reasonable person would pick up the same implication from your words and it is disingenuous to so heavily imply something in the form of a loaded question and then feign innocence by protesting that your words should only be interpreted exactly and literally. Communication doesn't work that way.

By asking the question "What's so magical and special about Activesync", you are implicitly stating that the alternatives are so good that ActiveSync has to actually use magic in order to be better than them. Putting a question mark at the end of an outrageous implication doesn't get you off the hook for implying outrageous claims.

Most abandonware is still under copyright, and it's not that hard to trace the ownership. Most defunct game studios were acquired by bigger studios, and they own the copyright.

Electrons can and often do travel much faster than that, but they go round and round in tiny circles and only drift through a conductor at an aggregate speed of a few cm per second. An electron's actual speed is, as with all physical things, based on its energy. You might as well imagine how fast rocks travel.

The second law of thermodynamics applies within our universe. Who knows what laws governed the creation of that universe in which that law applies? Maybe there's something outside what we naively call "the universe" from which the energy came?

My theory is, that matter and antimatter did exist in equal amounts. Matter travels one direction in time, antimatter travels the other direction. So the two forms of matter headed of in different temporal directions, and the original matter and antimatter will never meet. Antimatter can be created in high energy interactions though, which explains why there is some around, but that isn't the original antimatter.

Really? I'm genuinely surprised. It wasn't intended to be obnoxious. What, specifically? Do you find USians offensive? I used it merely as a more specific term than "Americans" since the US is part of the Americas. Sorry if it's got some connotation of which I was unaware.

Diesel is a sub-type of gasoline. In France, they are labelled "Essence" and "Gazole" - "Essence" is what we in the UK call "petrol" and what you call "gas", "gazole" is diesel. So you USians use "gas" as a shortcut for "regular non-diesel gasoline" and "diesel" for "diesel gasoline".

Yeah, instant Wikipedia and IMDB pages direct to my eyeballs, as well as facial recognition linked to Facebook.

Agreed. iGoogle is my home page.

But another telco is providing that connection to the actual land line phones, so Skype are not occupying a public resource. Is it reasonable for Skype to be required to implement 999 (or whatever it is in France, but that would be like 911 in the US) calls from within Skype on a PC? And, is it reasonable for Skype to be required to provide the location of your PC, or your mobile phone, or your ipad, to the authorities when you make such a call? How is Skype going to know where my PC is? How is Skype going to know where my iPad is if I'm using a tethered 'phone to make a call?

What they need is rats. Lots of rats.