When playing Wii games, the Wii U isn't emulating anything. It switches to a hardware compatibility mode and essentially becomes a Wii. And since the Wii doesn't know how to talk to the pad, the pad shuts down. This is exactly how the Wii handled Gamecube compatibility - which is one way to guarantee games will work.

Also, Wiimotes show up just fine for games that support them. There's even an option to pair them in the Wii U's home menu. It's actually rather nice to not have to buy a whole new set of controllers when moving to the next generation for once.

The Wii also never played DVDs, so it's no surprise the Wii U doesn't play Blu Rays, DVDs or any other non-game media.

Oh, and the OS GUI was recently patched to more than halve application switching times and support background downloads.

What's hard to figure out is just what Nintendo's 1st party studios have been doing all this time, since support for the Wii effectively ended a long time ago. It seems like the transition to HD has hit them with the same difficulties a lot of other Japanese studios faced. So crucial software is in short supply and titles original slated for the launch window are still months away from actual release.

But as you say, it is possible for Nintendo's 1st party output to carry a system to profitability. The Gamecube era was, after all. So it's doubtful Nintendo has much to worry about whether the Wii U ultimately turns around to mass market success or not.

If you do transfer your software from the Wii (which rarely fails except in cases of power loss or user error), it does not "brick" the Wii. The software is simply moved over and the Wii is no longer attached to those titles for redownload purposes.

And the fact is, lack of backwards compatibility makes the PS3 and 360 accounts systems meaningless. There is no way to transfer purchased titles to the next generations of those systems at all. So once the PS3 and 360 are no longer made, those games are effectively lost once the systems die - account system or no.

Microsoft switched CPUs and the new system isn't powerful enough to emulate the old in software, so it was pretty much certain the new X-Box would drop all compatibility. The problem is that this cuts off any migration path for 360 owners. So since they'll have to buy an all new library from scratch anyway, there's no reason not to jump ship to the PS4, Wii U or whatever. It's an understandable move, but one that's liable to hurt in the short term at least.

The taste is close enough, but you couldn't switch it overnight without people noticing.

Then why did they switch to 100% HFCS 6 months prior to introducing New Coke?

Wayland promises to eliminate tearing, lag, redrawing or flicker, which would be a welcome change.

Backwards compatibility did help the PS2, along with Nintendo's long line of portables. But the PS3 architecture is unsustainable, so there was never any chance those games would be supported by the PS4. The best one can hope for is that they'll be recompiled for the new architecture and put up on Sony's download shop someday in the future.

Yeah an archive that may never be playable. The point of archiving is preservation, but a lot of good that FLAC archive would do someone who found it in 1000 years while sifting through the remnants of Earth - they will have a lot easier time finding a device that still exists that plays MP3 than they would FLAC or what have you.

FLAC is about an order of magnitude simpler than MP3. I once implemented a decoder in about an hour over lunch just because I could. And because many lossless codecs feature error detection, they're much more likely to survive as a long-term archive than something like MP3 which doesn't even have a container or any reliable way to verify that the file's contents are correct.

And you never have to re-rip physical discs. 128kb/s CBR MP3 used to be the standard. Then 192 VBR. Then AAC. And so on and so forth. So by keeping a lossless archive, one will always be able to transcode to the latest-and-greatest lossy codec without a lot of hassle.

I've integrated a silly little timer into my editor which alternates between long work periods and short break periods. I'll check emails and the interwebs on the breaks and close/minimize browsers to focus on task during the work times. At first I look forward to those little break times, but I get into a nice zone by the end of the day.

The language is named after Monty Python's Flying Circus, but the trademark only applies to software.

The Python trademark was registered some time ago in the US but it's unclear why the Python Software Foundation didn't do the same in the EU.

First they give the money back to the shareholders, then they shut the company down.

If I don't switch the numbers around on New Year's, I'm liable to forget until quite awhile later.

The Linux kernel management style is well documented.

For example:

Similarly, don't be too polite or subtle about things. Politeness easily ends up going overboard and hiding the problem, and as they say, "On the internet, nobody can hear you being subtle". Use a big blunt object to hammer the point in, because you can't really depend on people getting your point otherwise.