Patents last 17 years, not forever. You can't "suppress" something permanently by patenting it - quite the opposite really because the patent is now published and once it expires others can begin to use it. The point of patents is to let those who developed an invention have a chance to profit from them and be glad they shared the idea at all; in software that mostly doesn't work but I'm not convinced it's such a bad idea with expensive machine parts.

WPA-PSK is insufficiently secure... and it's Amazon's fault? Stupid. Did they crack https? No. So clearly there are sufficiently secure technologies. Use them. Don't prop up crap technologies by calling in the Feds. Honestly, invoking the law to resolve a problem that clearly doesn't require it is an actively dangerous habit of thought. And I'm hardly a libertarian. I just know a bad idea when I see one.

LiveJournal has always permitted one-way "friend" relationships, helpfully distinguishing the "mutual friends" for you. This patent is just silly.

A "first to file" system wouldn't be completely disastrous provided that evidence of prior art was still enough to scuttle the patent.

I had one of these too. You can still get similar kits from Radio Shack. For younger kids they have versions that just snap together from modules. My daughter enjoyed these. The newer kits do feature ICs, which is fine, but the snap-together sets came with disappointing instructions that seemed to give up on explaining how things work when they got to the ICs.

Okay, so what should we do with North Korea, exactly? They have nuclear weapons, complete control of the information available to their populace, a crumbling food production system and a huge army as well as hordes of mortars aimed at Seoul. Good luck...

I am a constant critic of my own country's policy but when it comes to North Korea I rarely point the finger because I really don't know what can be done.

(I made an exception when Bush actually taunted them without the slightest ability to back it up. THAT actually managed to make matters worse, which is an accomplishment.)