Asimov's stuff is fantastic. If you want something a bit more math based, consider Flatland by Abbot. That also contains a fair bit of social commentary.

I would be surprised if they did. I have subscribed to netflix for years and what I want is convenience and the ability to find new things. It wouldn't be possible for me to download everything I want in a month, because I don't know today what I will want next month. And even if I did, new stuff will be added.

Most importantly, even if I did know what I wanted and didn't worry about new content, it would be inconvenient for me to do that.

Sadly, not everyone knows. Lots of gamers just buy the games without really paying any attention to who the publisher is much less whether that publisher treated its customer's well or not.

"Of course, how they expect to have any university-affiliated distinguished scientists is a different question."

This could be a point if the problem applied to scientific fields, but it at least seems to be much less of an issue there. Getting a tenure track position in math or a science is not easy by any stretch, but it is much more realistic than what this person is describing for Literature.

Now, asking how they expect to have any distinguished Literature Professors associated with the University might be a valid question, but its not clear many Universities are overly worried about that.

Well said. Also consider offering technical support only to those that have purchased the product. Technogical attempts to stop it will likely do more to annoy your real customers than deter the pirates.

I would rather see movies become shorter. I liked The Hobbit, but I think it would have benefitted by leaving another 20 minutes or so on the cutting room floor, including that entire first segment between Frodo and Bilbo.

Netflix uses USPS extensively. There are also certain legal matters that for the moment require the physical exchange of documents (anything that requires a notary for a very simple example). Many of them go through FedEx/UPS of course, but for some non-urgent ones USPS makes complete sense.

The USPS may be fading, but there is still a need for the immediate future and ending saturday delivery is a very logical way to make up some of its revenue gap.

It depends. When we are talking about desktop applications (whether consumer or purely in-house), then there should certainly be a user friendly install package for everyone's sake. It makes it easier for the front-line help-desk, easier for the user, and saves the developer time. For complex server packages, I would be much more tolerant of not creating a simple install package. For something like that, creating a simple install package might be very difficult and might loose the ability to customize each install for that particular server. Such packages are not installed frequently and there is often good reason the installation is complex. With that said, the install process should at least be well documented. If it is not well documented, then you can run into problems if (when) you loose that particular developer.

First, I would pick a distro, that makes it a lot easier to sell. I unhesitatingly recommend Ubuntu for someone that wants Linux on the desktop.

But as for what needs to be done, while I use Ubuntu I also still use Windows. Windows really is a pretty good OS, IMHO. But more than that, there are several important programs that have no Linux counterparts. There are few AAA games on Linux. Also, as much as I love LibreOffice, MS Office is sometimes an absolute requirement.

He was a great and impressive man. Still, I hate daylight savings time.

#2 is murky. Clearly the box and physical items are goods, and interactive online access is a service. But it is not clear that a license should be needed for software. While there is now some case law on EULA's it is far from clear yet. After all, I do not need a license to read a book. Why should I need a license to use software I purchased? And even the cases that say a EULA is enforceable generally view it as a contract of adhesion, which means it is subject to scrutiny for what the company can put in it and so those contours are very unclear. And you mention copyrights and patents, but I only need to worry about copyrights and patents if I am doing something which is protected by those. It is fairly clear that most uses of most software (even software that in some way invokes a patent) are *not* covered by patents. Most uses of software do involve some sort of copying, but that kind of transient copying which is necessary to make any use of the purchased software at all would almost certainly fall under fair use. So, #2 is extremely murky. And there are plenty of software cases that don't implicate 1 or 3 and some of those are murky. Do I buy anything when I use GoodOldGames.com (great site incidentally), or am I licensing it? Is it a sale of a good or a service or neither?

I think any progress in nuclear power is probably a good thing for the environment and economy.

There are a fair number of people without fingerprints though. There is a genetic condition that will cause it as well as certain occupations/hobbies that will effectively sand them away (bricklaying is one amoungst several).

Cutting them down and using them for anything other than burning them (or letting them decay) would sequester the carbon they had captured for relatively long periods of time. That does actually include burying them as long as it is in a way that would deter natural decay (many of the bacteria involved release CO2).

COPPA of course. COPPA made it almost impossible for a non-specialized provider like Google to provide services to children under 13 in a legal fashion in a way that is cost effective and profitable. In a situation like that, of course Google's way to comply is to ban accounts for users under 13.

Now, the question is, is it a good thing for COPPA to essentially force non-specialized interactive services to not deal with children?

I am strongly of the opinion that it should be the parents responsibility to guide, gaurd, and teach their children and that COPPA should not exist. But I also understand the counterargument that it is hard for parents to do that without some restrainints on corporations as well.