Euro-peon here (Ireland). I use a debit card linked to my current (checking) account for small purchases, and a credit card for online and larger purchases, which I can usually pay off every month unless it's very large. The debit card is touch-enabled, which has some security features built in. Touch purchases are limited to €30 and after three of those you'll be asked to insert the card and enter the PIN - so if the touch system is compromised there's a "stop" on that. As far as I can tell those touch purchases are authorised without checking your current balance, and might not hit your account until days later.

I have heard of "walk-by" attacks on touch cards here - e.g. one lady I know had €11 taken off her card that was apparently billed to a pay email service on an ISP in New Zealand. Small, one-off charges that the payee might not even notice if they are a heavy user of that card. There are things you can do to avoid that, such as not keeping the card on you in an obvious place such as handbag or back pocket. Or tin foil.

Years ago, in my first job, I worked in a steel factory on control systems. They had a "gas plant" heated coal to extract coal gas for use elsewhere in the factory, which was a potentially hazardous environment, to put it politely. Despite the fire risk from the gas, they had to have electronic CO sensors for safety and to measure the gas quality, but those were designed to be safe in that environment. Beyond that, there were no electronics in the plant, nothing that could cause a spark. The control systems for the plant itself were all pneumatic, and were pretty amazing in retrospect. I'm talking full proportional (PID) control, not just on-off switching. You had pneumatic actuators which were like pneumatic transistors: a tiny pressure controlling a hefty valve that controlled large gas flows precisely.

Why not a hydrogen/helium mixture? Everyone seems to be treating this as either/or proposition when it doesn't need to be. For example, helium is a neutral gas, so wouldn't it serve to reduce the flammability of hydrogen?

One immediate problem I can think of would be separation of the gases in to layers, meaning an inconsistent mix. If that's a problem - and I'm not sure that it is - it could be tackled by limiting the height of the gas cells: just make them thinner and flatter. A simple fan could also keep the gas moving if necessary to prevent stratification.

I found an old posting that seems to indicate that you could only have up to 8.7% hydrogen for the mixture to be safe, and that's not enough to make a difference (since the lifting power of hydrogen isn't that much better than helium's. A mix with more hydrogen might then be better classed as "less flammable", rather than setting up an expectation that the gas be totally non-flammable. If some helium can "tame" hydrogen a bit, I think that would be worth pursuing.

I can see this research scoring a nomination for an Ig Nobel Prize in Chemistry this year. For comparison, last year's prize went to Volkswagen AG for their innovative vehicle pollution control measures.

Then the Congresscritters grab it, pack it in to barrels, and ship it back to their districts ...

If you want an identical copy, just mirror the GVFS path to a non-GVFS path, and there's your local copy.

Ireland has similar rules too, including no indoors smoking in anything that could be called a workplace. This includes pubs, which had a major impact, as you can imagine.

I have no sympathy. Smoking is entirely unnecessary. People keep doing it only because they are addicted to it, not for any other positive reasons. It can go entirely without any objectively negative impacts whatsoever.

... are the ones whose citizens probably present the least threat to the USA. That's why they're in the Visa Waiver program in the first place. Way to alienate your friends, DHS.

When writers use words like that, do they understand what they mean in mathematical terms? I have my doubts.

I'd rather get a Pentax K-1 for half the price. Full frame, 36MP, image quality way up there, superior in some cases (particularly for static scenes using Pixel Shift), in-body stabilisation (doesn't need new lenses). Video facilities not as good, though: the K-1 doesn't do 4K but does do Full HD @ 60fps.

It doesn't do everything, but what it does, it does very well. Besides, why get what everyone else gets? Canon and Nikon are the Toyota and Nissan of camera companies. Boring. ;-)

What part of "experiment" was unclear? You might think you know what's going to happen, based on your jaundiced, deterministic model of human nature, but in a world of network effects and unintended consequences, we don't actually know.

One caveat I do have, personally, is that people should not get extra money just for having children. We don't want to encourage procreation for the sake of money. The world is overpopulated world, people should not hve children unless they can cover the cost.

I'm expecting to have to support it, so I went the Insider route on a tablet PC I have that didn't work for me with Windows 8. Happy enough with the results. I haven't yet found a program that doesn't work. I even got a Windows Phone (Lumia 640) a year ago, because I was bored of Android. That's running W10 too, and I haven't regretted it. (The "no apps" whining is largely bogus: half or more of the apps people complain about Windows Phone not having are basically websites in app form: just use the mobile website instead.)

I've supported Windows Server systems for years, and long wondered when someone was going to do an Internet-based Single Sign-On (SSO) service like a Windows Domain. That's basically what M$ did, though understandably feature-limited. No "roaming profiles": too bandwidth-intensive, and it might not be necessary in a "cloud" world.

I consider Microsoft to be on "probation", how they behave will determine whether I stick with Windows. From a career point of view, I might even go for W10 certification, just to be ahead of the curve - it wouldn't be a major pain to do, in my opinion. If they screw it up, I can still get work done on Linux. I'm not so "invested" in Windows that I would get upset either way.

Ireland is the same - I recently purchased a SIM to use in a cheap phone I had lying around, neither required any ID or registration at all. So I have a "burner" already, now what shall I do with it ..?

OK ... and what drives a hydroelectric power plant, then? It also uses "fuel", in the form of the gravitational potential energy of water. Which it gets for free, essentially. You can even use "spare" power from e.g. intermittent wind power to pump more water in to the dam (pumped storage).

Besides, plants and animals don't get their fuel from sources that were formed deep underground over millions of year.