When USA goes back to a peaceful nation and starts cooperating with other countries instead of competing with them, I'll start buying American again.

Serious question here. What is the USA doing wrong, and what of that are things that other countries are not doing?

There are many things in Net 2.0 that are very popular, but that do not necessarily have utility or profitability.

For example, just about everyone and their dog (on the internet, no one can tell you're a werewolf) uses Facebook, and before it MySpace, Friendster, Digg, Reddit, etc. But do these services have a working business model? It seems they all flounder at that point.

It seems to me that most Net 2.0 firms have an unsustainable business model, which is:

1. Get really popular.
2. ???
3. Sell company -> Profit!

In the same way, we know we've got a lot of people who like using their phones to tweet, click, troll, sext, etc. But is this actually useful? And other than the cell phone providers, is anyone making money off this with a sustainable model?

Start building them here in the USA.

If labor costs are too high, use robots.

I think it's great: the Earth clearly needs a death star to defend against incoming asteroids, comets and meteorites.

It will also come in handy if we ever have a rebellion against our UN space program...

If you're buying something, be very careful but it's acceptable.

However, on freebie sites like Facebook it makes no sense to let them see into your life.

It's amazing how many people will rail against "corporations" and then put their entire life history, home address, pictures of friends and family, etc. into Facebook.

I think these gentle reminders about security are great and are part of the spirit of hacking.

Which would the USA rather have: (a) goofball hackers create a zombie panic, or (b) our next enemy uses a coordinated attack to create actual panic?

Reminds me of the infamous "War of the Worlds" broadcast by Orson Welles.

I can see Ron Paul's side of things.

He needs to control his brand, and to own it outright. Thus, he benefits not only from having ownership, but having his legal right made clear.

When we first look at this story, it's like "LOL irony afoot. Free market, bitches!"

But after some sober contemplation, one can see the wisdom of the Ron Paul team's position.

I still think that, were Ron Paul to adopt the foreign policy outlook of his son Rand, he would be electable overnight.

Used to live in a city with "free wifi". It was horrendously slow because everybody used it and most still paid a normal provider.

If you make a public resource, you have what economists call a "free rider" problem: most people aren't obligated to pay in to it, so they simply take advantage of it without paying in.

This causes the quality of service to decline. It is related to the "Tragedy of the Commons" where overconsumption of a public resource results in its depletion.

A better option to "free" internet might be aiming to lower costs and improve performance, and then allow local residents to use additional bandwidth to provide free local hotspots.

Here's a hypothesis:

Google beat the last challenge from the antitrust attorneys from Texas, but it can't count on the future.

Specifically, other states or federal entities could attack it, and then there's all of the EU, which traditionally takes a harder line on privacy violation and monopoly.

Schmidt is no dummy and so he's divesting a reasonable amount (less than half) of his stock to hedge against a potential catastrophic future decline.

Remember what happened to Microsoft. They basically floundered hard after an assault by the department of justice. If the same happens to Google, they'll have to put most of their plans on hold for a decade as well.

For Apple, and the rest of the corporate world, it's bad news, because it seems it's getting harder and harder to use patents as weapons.

I think this could have a positive effect including for the corporate world. The end of patents-as-weapons will make it easier to introduce new products without getting sued, and mean companies spending less time in expensive courtroom battles.

If I want to introduce the next iPod or Xbox 360 or just about anything, someone out there has a patent that covers something on it, from simple stuff like "the power button flashes twice when the power goes on" to the inner workings. Having less patent power could be a good thing.

Then again, I'm not sure that's what this case is about. The patents themselves were found to be improperly constructed at trial. Thus, this case deals with those patents alone, although I like your spin on it :)

Whenever the USPS has money, the Congress puts more rules on it. The most recent was the rule about having to pay forward its health care expenses:

http://www.federaltimes.com/article/20121001/DEPARTMENTS02/310010002/USPS-again-defaults-health-care-payment

The pensions, union rules and other government regulations are strangling this once-great postal service, and it can't keep up. Removing these rules would allow it to be competitive again.

If you're using Firefox, one problem is that they've been very tardy with H.264 support, for ideological reasons.

I understand some of their reasoning and am not critical of it.

If anything, I think every FireFox user should try it without Flash. There just are not crashes. It's inspiring.

People will still write, will still sing, and will still make movies.

Yes, but will we get the same quality of work?

Ernest Hemingway was able to devote his life to his writing because it not only paid the bills, but paid comparable to work as an attorney or doctor.

If writing pays nothing, he'll take those other jobs instead, and not have the time to write the masterpieces he would do otherwise.

That said, I don't agree with how copyright is used/abused these days and I think it's an outdated idea. Human culture and advancement has always been built on the basic human desire to share good ideas/music/art/recipes etc.

I think this is the core of the issue.

On one hand, sharing information is a great thing.

On the other hand, that information will not get developed if it doesn't pay off handsomely.

My concern is making sure we can continue to fund quality books, movies, etc. We can find people to do it for free, but people who get paid to do it can do it full time and may do a better job.