I agree. I think they're going about it at entirely the wrong angle. Instead of stopping children from doing a particular activity (be it learning electronics, model rocketry, or even pyrotechnics) shouldn't we be encouraging their creativity and initiative? Instead of saying 'stop doing that, it's naughty', saying 'that's really cool. You could do that to help the world'?
Maybe I'm naive, but I believe that if you were to encourage children in these activities, engage with them and let them know that you think they are doing something positive, they'd be less likely to use them for something bad. The world will always have religious fanatics, people who disagree with a state's ideologies and values, but by stifling childrens' initiative, the only thing you're doing is driving them away.

Furthermore, if it's just a mat with no physical contact needed between the erm... contacts, slight differences in standards could cause major, battery-exploding issues.

This opens up a wide range of opportunities.... much like microwaves. See what happens when you put other shit on the mat.
Like a lump of really conductive metal.
Or a baby

I also have a cat around that age (perhaps a couple years younger), and he is also extremely healthy. He spends most of his time outdoors, and usually sleeps out there, unless it's very cold, or raining, or he'd rather play with the dogs all night. He used to have a habit of bringing us back birds or mice (and even once a bat, which still amazes me to this day), but it never really bothered me. In fact, I found it very amusing.

I pretty much trust my cat to not get itself killed (fighting is ok, it's HIS garden, not that ginger piece of crap from next door), as he's a fairly clever animal. I know that if I let him out, he's going to come back for food in a few hours, or sleep in the shed, or go wherever it is he spends his time. Then eventually he'll come back, come to my room and curl up on the bed.

Sure, it might be cool to track him, maybe a bit of a novelty, but I would think that anyone who trusts their pets to go outside (the majority of cat owners, I would think) already know that they're going to be OK. And the only time you'd need GPS on an indoor animal is if it escaped, which might mean you're not doing your job right or just got outwitted by a dog or rodent.

Yarrr she be a harsh mistress...
So yes. Yes it is.

This is beginning to sound like Battle Royale! What'd be interesting is to hook a more predatory creature up to this system. Give them the same reward system as the mice, and see how much the outcome in the game mimics nature.

This would be good, and I'd feel more comfortable with it if the people were reporting for the good of the community. But they won't be. They'll be reporting 'offenders' for cash prizes. 'Offenders', because you can bet people will be desperate to report anything in the hope that they'll get some cash. So the amount of false positives will be astronomical.

I'm in favour of giving more power to the people to govern our own society, but offering cash incentives to do so seems so wrong to me.

Sure, getting klingons on uranus is not wholly irregular, but infrared klingons? There's something wrong with uranus, my friend. Eat less curry.

Seconding Snow Crash. It's a brilliant book written by a brilliant author. If you're being a genre-nazi, it's post-cyberpunk.. so a sub-subgenre of SciFi. For cases that have directly influenced society, Snow Crash isn't an awful example. The Metaverse is the inspiration behind... erm... Second Life. But apart from that, it's a good read. Heavily recommended.

Twitterers? That doesn't sound right. Surely the correct term is twats/twits?

Spoken like a true australian.

I bet, if he was still alive, an apology... would make... Turing complete. Terribly sorry.

Does that make third post equivalent to the marketing or the development?

It doesn't have support out of the shoebox, but it is upgradeable.