I'm American and *I* thought it was something for and about trigger-happy rednecks.

Does it surprise anyone TFA is covered in ads for various security "solutions"? Script kiddies have been around forever, this article is just crap content intended to male the site go 'viral'. Why would /. Post this crap?

What percentage of e-mail sent to you is spam?

Percentages aren't useful when talking about spam.

The details are that the messages were never delivered in the first place, your setup would not protect against such a problem.

For a while there were a few states that had civil unions, which then discovered that civil unions would not be recognized across state lines, let alone international lines. When New York started recognizing gay marriage (before they started performing it) it came down to the fact that a marriage performed anywhere in the world would otherwise be recognized, even if the marriage would have been illegal to perform in NY. Many countries will recognize marriages performed outside their territory, so long as it was legal in the country in which the marriage was performed. Very few such laws exist for civil unions, even when the state/country in question performs civil unions.

Want to stop using the word 'marriage' in law? Fine, but you'll never get all 50 states to agree to it, let alone the rest of the world. Marriage is portable, civil unions are not.

The other reason is that the moment the religious right decided they wanted to make sure they could continue to feel morally superior because they could marry and gays couldn't, it became an issue of legalized discrimination, even if it's only a word.

Actually, the oddity is he did sign that agreement, the background on the story is that he bought seeds from the grain elevator for a late-season planting. For his first planting, he bought the seeds from Monsanto. I suppose the contract was interpreted to only apply to that purchase.

But aside from that, since the seeds in question were bought from the grain elevator, yes, sue the anyone selling to the grain elevator (which probably includes Bowman).

It takes up a significant portion of the screen, is present for months, and has a tiny 'x' to close it which is next to impossible to hit on a mobile device. That's as polite as a beggar jumping right in your way and holding his sign right in front of your face.

That said, I've given to Wikipedia before. Not lately though, I got too sick of their ads.

Of course, I use adblock, so I see very little of the normal kind of ads.

As for this article, I don't care if it hurts the people who are paying for ads to be put up. Simply spending money doesn't give you a right to be heard. I wouldn't be surprised if some sites started blocking Free.fr or accusing them of "stealing".

It could be enforced by technical means, though. They could set up their servers to check the referer and whitelist only permitted referer domains. There are other, more complex schemes as well.

Of course, they'd prefer to sue and profit rather than preventing the "problem" in the first place. Hopefully there's something in Irish law that requires them to take reasonable steps to limit damages before suing (better yet, hopefully they just get laughed out of court).

Simply increasing your prices by 10% does not constitute a loan or debt, it's not covered by usury laws. Nor is providing a discount for paying early, since that isn't interest, it isn't charged every month.

Now, 6% per month late fee, I guess that would depend on whether the jurisdiction's usury law covered an involuntary loan (you've forced your vendor to extend you credit without an agreement to do so).

Aren't there credit reporting agencies for corporations? Isn't there a way this guy could damage the credit of the deadbeats?

That would address most of the problems I have, except for the lack of accessories.

There's one other reason I want to get an iOS device. There's an app called Coaster that's made for iOS and Android. However, the app developer blocked it from Android tablet devices. I don't have a smartphone, just a tablet with data. The app will work on an iPad Mini, but even after I tried to hack my tablet to run smartphone-only software, it refused to install. I tried contacting the developer to no avail. So yes, apps are important.

I've got an Android tablet on T-mobile (Galaxy Tab 7 Plus). I've had it for about a year now. Before that I had the Droid Triumph, the Droid, and the G1. For all of these except the G1, I've had to find custom firmware. The pre-installed, unremovable shovelware is annoying, but the lack of updates is unacceptable. The iPhone 3GS was released 3.5 years ago and will run iOS 6, no waiting for the carrier to release the update.

Even with Samsung, supposedly a good Android manufacturer, my device hasn't received any major update since its release in August 2011. If I didn't root and update the device I would be stuck with an OS from July 2011. Even the custom firmware (derivative of CM, which doesn't officially support my device) has its issues, including Wifi problems.

Then there's the lack of accessories, I got a 7" tablet because I thought the larger screen would make for a better GPS device in my car. My tablet was advertised along side a "navigation dock" for this purpose. The dock was never released. It also won't charge off a computer's USB, unless the tablet is off. This applies even if you pay extra for their special "charge and sync" cable which Samsung claims will allow the device to charge while tethered (sharing the data connection) with your laptop.

As soon as Google Maps for iOS 6 comes out, I'm switching to an iPad Mini. Looks like the AT&T version should work fine on T-mobile. I really liked Android, but it's far too rough around the edges for its maturity.

You're against T-mo getting more spectrum so they can improve coverage? Why?

Or like in California, where we vote to increase business, sales, and income taxes via propositions to balance the budget.

It's not like CA gets a choice in how much the federal gov sucks from us. The comparison is based on federal income taxes paid by residents vs. federal spending in the state (including grants to state and local government, and in CA's case, federal spending on investigators/police attempting to enforce federal law against businesses which are legal under state law). Federal spending also includes spending on military bases and defense contracts.

As for the budget problems, Sacramento is working on it. I certainly wouldn't call CA a "failed state". We have businesses, including thriving startups. We also have public transit and an much more democratic process than the big states back east.

Your information is laughably out of date

Gold clauses were reinstated in 1977, some 35 years ago (at least in the U.S., perhaps there's another country out there that barred gold clauses). http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gold_clause

In any case, a currency's value comes from acceptance and trust in future acceptance, by both merchants and the government. Individuals rely on the government to ensure that the currency does not become worthless. This doesn't always work. When the U.S. dollar was backed by gold, it did vary in value, sometimes in "shocks" that would cause the value to change drastically in a matter of weeks. What's the point of tying currency to a metal when the value actually comes from the ability to trade the currency?

Metals change in value, fiat currency changes in value, everything changes in value. It's preferable to keep currency somewhat stable in value (avoid rapid changes) so that wages and prices don't have to be adjusted every week. Long term, changes in the value will happen no matter what the currency is based on, and that really only affects debt. Lenders have to take inflation into account when calculating interest. If you're worried about your savings getting inflated away, buy a productive asset. If you really think a hunk of metal will have a good value in the future, you can even buy that. Personally, I think it's more likely a business will continue to have value in the future. For instance, a profitable brewery (a business that can command a premium on its work-product) is likely to hold its value well, so buy an interest in the brewery. If you're worried about one particular brewery losing value, spread your risk by buying interests in many breweries. If you're worried the whole industry will lose value, buy interest in many industries.

Money's primary usefulness is short-term, a medium of exchange. That's the aspect of it that needs to be preserved, not its ability to hold long-term value.