"many farmers still depend on them. ... Internet service spread much more slowly in France than it did elsewhere in Europe or in the United States, largely because of the popularity of the Minitel, historians say. Only around the turn of the century did the Internet come to much of this soggy western region"

Seriously? Farmers depend on Minitel? I never saw that in my "soggy wester region", Normandy. Also, care to give citations for what I bolded out? Hell in the US there are still vast portions of the country very, very badly covered by high speed internet access or not at all which isn't true in France. Who are these "historians"?

Was this article written by a Texan rancher who still strikes out "French fries" on restaurant menus to write "Liberty fries"?

Amen to that. I don't care whether or not my smartphone has Angry Birds, but I care that I can quickly browse my inbox and answer a few emails, reply to meeting invites and proof read documents without having to wonder when the heck will I have one hour near a power socket to charge it.

Yes, I know. Everyone here does. Still, it doesn't say "it doesn't get viruses"; there ought to be a reason for that. And in most people's mind, a Mac is still not a PC.

Well in all "honesty" apple's own webpage says "it doesn't get PC viruses". Technically, it doesn't; it gets Mac malware. But I know, it isn't honest, hence my first quotes, and to most people that does mean that "it doesn't get anything bad, unlike that stupid windows thingy".

I have a 500 GB USB HDD plugged to a pogoplug at home, and have put another one pogoplug+hdd at a friend's house. I backup my macbook pro using arsync over aftp, my linux boxes using rsync over ssh, and my wife copies files from her win7 manually (she only has punctually a few stuff she wants to save) using windows shares because i added samba to my pogoplug (it's a linux and they give you root access). Then, the pogoplug software automagically mirrors my home's pogoplug to the one at my friend's. So there you have local daily backups and automatic off-site backups for 300$ (100$ for 2 pogoplugs, 200$ for these HDDs when i bought them; you'd get one TB each now i guess). And I can access my files using a web interface from anywhere, and give web links to any file i want for friends to download stuff. Cheap, convenient, multiplatform, reliable, you have total control. What else?

I stand corrected. Thanks for the clarification.

"Something this expensive is going to have numerous measures to prevent enemies from gaining physical access"
"Secondly, I would expect military grade equipment to be fail-secure."
"I would really, really hope start of the art military hardware is more secure than a simple PS3"

Lots of assumptions and "hopes" here... Which one you think will get screwed up due to budget costs? Or simple mistakes? You just need one to see enemy "hackers" nuclear bombing US targets.

Remember how the most expensive jet at the time (the Harrier I think?) would become uncontrollable when passing time zones? The more automation you put in something, the more failures become likely and dangerous.

I can't wait to pay yet another 70$ a month for yet another 3g/4g connection. It's time to invent the one-person, multi-device mobile subscription.

Sounds like all the "that new stuff is new so it's dangerous" crap we always hear. Since i was a child and started spending time on my brother's amstrad i've heard people explain me how I was damaging my health. I then spent the next 20 years or so not giving a damn and spending my days and nights in front of computers; now my eye sight is still of 10/10 both eyes and i have none of these arithric / back / wrist / fingers issues i keep hearing about. Plus it's what got me a job and pays the bills, so i'll continue spending my life in front of computers and not giving a damn.

So now we won't be able to copy-paste a google search to someone to brag "AHAH ! First page, first result!" because everyone's result will be different. Not sure that's a great feature.

Aaaaaand slashdotted.

Slashdotted a planet 150 lights years away. The power of /. has no limit.

I use these services for personal use indeed. There's no industrial secret (or any secret) in my personal email. But my business stores everything in house and email communication with key partners or customers is on TLS.

Is my business the only one ever to realise that blackberry stores your emails on their servers, and that the patriot act gives US government the right to read it? I don't understand why so many businesses overlook that.

That appropriate word is "avant-garde". Nothing non-ASCII in here. (not that anyone cares but well... you're a surrender-monkey snail eater spelling nazi or you're not; and I am)

Aaand thanks to that article we now have people thinking there's actually a EU President like there's a US President.