This is how they should spend the money: a vasectomy for dad, therapy for the kid in twenty years, college fund, and a parenting coach.

One of the only ads I saw during the Super Bowl (I was much more interested in the dip at the party) was for an Android phone that included a clip of "David After Dentist." Since Youtube users don't give up the rights, Youtube (or Motorola or whoever's ad it was) would have to obtain rights from the owners (the kid's despicable parents) somehow.

This is truly disgusting and overall sad. Videos of intoxicated adults are rarely funny, but videotaping a child on drugs and selling it is completely pornographic. These parents ought to be ashamed of themselves. They ought to get their child privileges revoked right away. Right on to adosch and wcrowe.

Perhaps the author isn't American; did you think of that?

I get really irritated when I hear people making these concessions in the name of "providing a good experience." What they're talking about is staying competitive so that they can keep making money. There's nothing wrong with that, morally, ethically or otherwise. So why can't they just say it? Record companies are the same way: they always do this silly stuff in the name of people enjoying the content. For once I would like to hear some corporation just say "We'd like to support X, but for now we think the better way for us to make money is to support Y."

The contributor didn't assume everyone on Slashdot knows his name, just that some of us would. It's safe to assume that those who have heard of him know what he has done in his career, and fully comprehend his awesomeness.

Seriously, the US Air Force has had this technology since 1946 and now we're just catching up?

And make sure no one has trademark rights to or a patent on the one you choose: don't use Ax=\lamda x or Match.com may sue your left shoulder.

This is my way of saying that although I declined to get my own tattoo, I'm glad that you're thinking of something intellectually worthy instead of getting an Apple, Inc tattoo or something else terribly impermanent. I actually read a b log post from a disgruntled "lifelong Mac user" who had recently switched to Ubuntu; he had an Apple tattoo.

F = ma baby!

Presenting at a conference and then publishing is done all the time. Most people make enough changes that no one could say "you've already presented this" anyway.

On the other hand, if somebody else has already presented it at a conference and the editors have seen it, it will look mighty suspicious if he submits it as original material. It will only mean rejection, but that would be the kind of thing where they'd say "this has already been presented elsewhere."

It's not THAT simple. First it has to get past the editor, which usually means you need a cover letter. More importantly, you must use a style in line with what the journal requests, adhere to all their guidelines or anything can be used as grounds for rejection.

Furthermore, if the editor doesn't know who you are, and you can't suggest reviewers, and you don't hold an academic position, he could reject it outright. Keep in mind that prejudice can creep in at any point in this process. In other words, it's not just about producing a good paper. Trust me, PLENTY of good papers get rejected for very unclearly stated reasons.

My suggestion is still to talk to someone who's experienced in producing scholarly material, and experienced in the publishing process.

Did he say his goal was to share his knowledge or to stifle others' creativity and go into a litigation career?

I would suggest you go to someone who you know in an academic or technical field that has published papers of this sort, and ask that person to help you publish it. If there's no university nearby, ask local friends if they know anybody --- if you're not in a similar situation, someone will remember a computer science or applied math professor from college.

You will probably need to improve your material with their help, too and that may mean sharing credit. As long as you establish up front that you mean to be the lead author, things should go well.

It depends on what you mean by "support." My university doesn't "support" GNU/Linux in the sense that they wouldn't fix your daughter's laptop if the screen fell off, but they might give her the relevant data she needs for networking. And then everything is done through the web, so she won't be missing anything essential for class. This is the very reason the web was built in the first place.

I use a GNU/Linux workstation and have had no problems. I don't know any undergrads who use GNU/Linux laptops, but my fellow grad students who do have not had any problems that they've told me about.

Network connectivity is the big one.

The other important one would be special applications, like Mathematica that she might be required to use for a class. IN that case I just run it off the nearest GNU/Linux cluster in an X server using ssh. Teach her how to do that and she'll be set.

Unfortunately people do shove proprietary software down the throats of every undergrad here; it's really disappointing. They're convinced that they have two choices when it comes to computing.