Sadly, this is exactly what happened in Stanislaw Lem's novel Fiasco. A good read, prompts a lot of thought of whether we could (and should) seek out extraterrestrial life.

I have attended ELAC and I could tell you that those courses are quite challenging and there's a LOT covered in each one of them. In addition, I believe that any physics-related majors are required to take ALL or MOST of the math courses available, which incidentally is the same requirements as for a Comp Sci Bachelors degree at UCLA. Maths include calculus 1-3, differential eqs, linear algebra, and discrete math. The 3rd physics (Optics and Waves) also includes a section on relativity, albeit not that big.
ELAC is known as one of the campuses where instructors are more strict and standards are a bit higher. For an 11-yr-old kid to breeze through all these advanced maths and physics classes is truly a big accomplishment.

Everyone talks about Circuit City, and indeed, these news are nothing new... Every electronics outlet does that to stay competitive, no? If everyone steals, you either steal too, or go out of business.

Here's an account of a former Circuit City employee.

A great resource for short sci-fi stories written by experienced as well as beginners.

But that's metric 60-100 Mbps. That's like... 7.5-12.5 MBps in US imperial units!

**AA

Here at UCLA (which participates in Internet2 and CENIC and some other organizations), it's not uncommon to see 40 Mbps download/upload in offices and 25 Mbps download/upload through the campus-wide WiFi for students. I can get WinXP SP3 in around 5 seconds...

Not to brag - I actually fear what might happen if some worm or hacker gets access to such high-speed network... :/

For a demo of OpenArena, see this video (no registration required).

I have been playing an AWESOME open-source FPS called OpenArena. It is based on the ioquake3 engine that id3 released under GPL license.

The game is absolutely free and all development is done by the community, including maps, media, and running the game servers. IMHO, it's the only game worth playing that gives me exactly what I need - less BS effects, more fast-paced action and great flexibility at customization (settings, mods, etc). Also, it has a somewhat small but very unique community of players, server admins, and of course clans + n00bs.

Direct download link for release 0.8.1: here.

Download, unzip, customize your settings, and you'll be fraggin' away!

The Joel on Software series is my favorite read. First book and second book.