Yes. I've done steel stud construction design for a handful of homes. Insulated Concrete Forms are also popular for exterior walls - they're set up like Legos, and then concrete is poured in them. Still, the use of wood outweighs concrete or steel by far more than 9:1 for home construction.

As someone with 12 years of structural experience, currently studying for their Structural Engineering exam: You're full of it.

A "stick built" home - that is, one built with sawn lumber and plywood - is generally better than a steel or concrete structure. A properly designed wood structure is much harder to permanently damage during a seismic or wind event than a concrete structure, and is generally easier to repair than a steel structure. The problem comes in that our older homes and buildings are *not* designed properly.

Speaking personally - If I'm in an earthquake, I would rather be in a stick-built structure built in the last twenty years than in a Concrete building built within the last five.

This isn't to say that there is *no* damage - there is - it's just that it's primarily cosmetic.

Actually, I've heard people use almost that exact reasoning. "Why do I need to have an accessible fire exit? Disabled people don't come in here, and if they do the employees will just carry them out" and the like. Also, "Yes, I know the building doesn't have anchors or clips keeping pieces together, but it's survived since 1930. Why should I add them just because I'm putting an HVAC system on the roof?

Very true. I worked on the design for a winery last year; the maximum runoff of their grey water was something along the lines of 1/8 of the total water needed for irrigation - and that's with a fairly water-heavy system on site.

And theres the rub. Warrantless wiretapping is clearly out-of-bounds for any level of government. Even if congress passed a law allowing this, the president signed it, his executive branch enforced it, and the supreme court affirmed it (and PUBLIC legal defense against the government attempts is the first place the telcos should have gone with this).

Except that warrantless wiretapping *is* allowed - for short periods of time, after which they need a FISA warrant. And wiretapping/review of foreign correspondence is explicitly allowed. Which means that there was a potentially legal argument that the orders were legit. As for it being out-of-bounds for government, yes it is. But let's take the case to the NSA, not the civilian schlubs they got to do the work.

As far as I know, I haven't personally committed any gross violations of the law in the past year, let alone the past month. By gross violation, I mean something other than parking illegally or speeding. We geeks like to think that everyone does what we do, but the truth is that geeks tend to enjoy dancing back and forth along the line of acceptability - and that leads to frequent violations of the law.

Either that, or I'm far more abnormal than I thought.

Let's be honest here: "I was just following orders" *should* be a valid defense, when you're referring to civilians. Is it *right*? No. But my understanding is that the Telecoms were given apparently-legal instructions by a legitimate authority, obeyed them, and then someone pointed out "Wait, that's not exactly kosher, people..." Did they (the telecoms) screw up? Absolutely. But there was an assumption that the telecoms made that the people in legal authority would not overstep their bounds. It's the same assumption we as civilians make every day - and the reason why we as a society prefer come down like a ton of bricks on anyone we find that violates that trust. Not because the crime itself is necessarily horrible (though it frequently is), but because by committing the crime through their offices, they stain the honor and/or sanctity of those offices. This isn't even entirely a governmental thing; it also applies to Doctors, Engineers, Religious teachers, Lawyers, and any of a thousand other situations. If a person with apparently legitimate authority tells you to do something that doesn't seem ridiculously out-of-bounds for their authority and you do it, you damned well should be protected.

Probably not, no. It'd have to be 1-1/4" or so (3.3 cm), which is effectively impossible with joists. If there's a concrete floor reinforced with some form of steel *fiber* - as opposed to rebar - I could see that interfering. Or steel mesh on the walls. Heh. I designed a house a few years ago that had chicken wire in the walls. I wonder if they can get 900Mhz reception?

Thanks! Know an English translation?

Yup. Also, Engineers use a Java applet from USGS to determine seismic requirements for structures. If I could not have Java, I could not work.

Yes, because no women are engineers. I mean, in addition to me, you have http://www.engineeryourlife.org/ http://www.engineergirl.org/ There are thousands of scientists and inventors that are women. Of the dozen women I know reasonably well, three are engineers, one has a PhD in Physics, and one runs her own technical company. In addition, 5 of my doctors (out of 7 total) have been women. So please, kindly shut the fuck up.

I still have business cards. I'm probably getting some more next year - and I just got this box of 250 in October. And no, I don't do random mailings of business cards, or anything like that. I had out one to each client, and sometimes give a client a small stack to give to their clients.

My wife and I have actually been watching more and more ads. They're making them funny and/or more interesting these days.

Nothing is earthquake-proof. You can build an *incredibly* rigid structure. But when you do, the quake will be just that much stronger, and knock it down anyway. Earthquake engineering isn't designing structures to not take damage. It's designing structures to take the minimum amount of damage. In some cases, entire sections of floor might be considered sacrificial - beams are designed to bend side to side (by cutting the top and bottom off the I) instead of passing the force to the column (causing the column, and everything above it, to fail). The reason we have so few fatalities here isn't because we build our buildings strong. It's because we build our buildings flexible. Most areas of the world used brick, mortar and other rigid stone-like materials for hundreds of years. California is just plain newer, so while we have failures they tend to be less catastrophic because of the amount of steel (a ductile metal) and wood used in construction.

Yes. And as one of his constituents, he has earned my vote over and over. Same with Peter DeFazio, though he's not quite as good at the tech stuff.