Would it be even possible to break the contract with AT&T, if you no longer agree with the new terms of Apple? I only have the iPod, although from what I understand it would make this fancy smart phone practically pointless with out all the apps..

haha - didn't realize I was actually defending him, I was just replying to Mr Whirly - didn't even know about CrazyJim :-P And no - I'm defiantly not defending him, intentionally at least...

More power to ya - I'm just saying that when that 0.000000001% discovers something brand new and changes the fundamental understanding on how we understand our surroundings - at least I can say that I wont be dumb founded and lost, as I would have already known that there was still more out there.. With a search I dug up this as a quick example - http://science.slashdot.org/story/08/11/03/2229248/New-Type-of-Particle-May-Have-Been-Found

Fixed that for you.. Other than that, I'm not so sure I would completely agree with your statement, science is changing all the time, and with the changes more and more doors are opening up - some shedding light and others opening to yet a another deep void that is left to be explained let alone theorized. Science has proven lately to show that previous scientific facts/proofs were flat out wrong because of these new doors that have opened - until 100% of everything is explained/proven and not merely theorized (and not 99.999% either as that remaining 0.001% can open yet another door to endless questions) saying that something isn't so is just plain ignorance. It's ignorant because you've stopped thinking/feeling for your self and has accepted what 'someone' else says is so...

You need to remember that 'religion' is the bureaucratic version of spirituality - two completely different things, like being human and being a corporate lawyer/politician is two completely different things (pun intended). Personally, I believe that science is looking for a needle in a haystack the size of the universe - in which the needle is sitting on your nose. The notion of "God" is so freaking simple it's ridiculous, although due to religion it has become so complicated and intricate that it is taking science to try and unravel it - aka, disprove it (which it won't)..

A simple question - whats *two* things that EVERY human being on this planet has in common, that's not biological or physical and regardless of religion or beliefs - and then ask your self what the relationship is...

I'd be curious to know if there was some kind of unofficial threat from the FBI that if the given operator doesn't comply they will be investigated for impeding the given investigation or something - as we all know we are breaking some kind of law at any given moment, although with the newly in acted laws for national security due to terrorism, we are probably violating these as well at any given time - let alone in the past...

There's something else I don't quite understand - I've had the gas pedal stick on me a more than few times because of the floor mat. The problem I'm having with Toyota's theory though is that in my situation the floor mat simply held the gas pedal where it was on each occasion - so when I went to stop/slow down, letting off the gas didn't do anything - but it sure as hell didn't floor the beast to where I was all the sudden doing 90 and thrown back into the seat (as one of the reports claim) and yes the brakes did still work - just more pressure was required to use them.

Great, I'm happy for you - seriously, you have a belief that your particular religion 100% supports and backs. Although, how can you possibly believe that you are NOT pushing your beliefs and religion onto others when yours is right and every one else is wrong?!?!

Ironically, this does have everything to do with religious freedom, and your again ignoring (or it's escaping you) the issue with terminology and the definition of marriage. Some very prominent religions forbid divorce, while others at the same scale allow it with out any issue what so ever - both having very different definitions of what marriage is suppose to be. As such, your beliefs have introduced another core fundamental difference - which from your use of words is obviously perfectly fine for you but apparently others who believe differently not only are the flat out wrong but they are bigots. Again, your the one forcing your beliefs on others - or they are labeled.

This is probably going to go over your head, (again) but I'll say it anyway - this is all about terminology. The government crossed the line a ways back when it endorsed, sanctioned and gives breaks to those in such a union - crossing the line when it comes to "separation of church and state". They should have instead had the "civil union" introduced, since in the eyes of the government the backing of a religion should be irrelevant and not tolerated - otherwise you get BS like this. The governments use of the term marriage instead of civil union, is the cause of everything around this. Since it uses a term from religious backgrounds - it merges church and state. As such, since your religion condones acts that fundamentally change the definition of what marriage is for many others, the terminology needs to be addressed as it's not the religious background that is relevant to the government nor should it be.

As you are proving with the name calling and labeling - ideals, beliefs and religious aspects are being introduced and argued upon solely because you need your beliefs to be accepted by the government due the one word - "marriage". If the government did not use the term, but instead the "civil union" for all religions, this would have come down to yet another splintering of religious sects. But because the gov uses the term, and the term has deep roots in many religions - and because your beliefs differ so much on those core roots, you have no choice but to change those core roots. Your use of name calling and labeling so eloquently proves my point - as petty as it is, your arguing that your beliefs and religion has the right to exist, in which there is no reason why it can't - although it -is- fundamentally different at certain levels and since the government uses the same terminology as this core belief, you have no choice but to re-define this terminology otherwise why in the hell would you care? What did you expect when you tried to redefine such a core belief in so many people? Jeeze, when Pluto was declassified as an actual planet many people flipped out about it and that belief was no where near the scale of what marriage is...

I oppose it and my reasons have zero to do with any religious or spiritual values/beliefes. Going along with the GP's argument, if your after state sanctioned and recognized "unions" that offer the same perks and legal rights as the state recognized and sanctioned "religious" unions - ie: marriage, then that's one thing and it should be recognized but not because your "gay" - but because the individuals involved are citizens of the given state.

Marriage always has been and always will be a religious matter. Those individuals who are not religious and want the 'perks' of making a commitment to each other - get the states version of marriage which is just a civil union that is happening to be using the same terminology - I'm referring to going to the local court house and getting hitched.

IF you are only after the 'perks' of the state sanctioned civil union, then this is a deal of the state crossing the line of the separation between church and state - and all federal/state government should scratch using the terminology of "marriage" and simply use "union" instead. If this is not the case, then sadly it's you who is trying to impose your religious values on others.

Why couldn't other software have this 'listening service' and there for be vulnerable?

From the security bulletin, XP SP2/3 and XP PRO x64 SP2 are vulnerable (DOS). "This security update resolves several privately reported vulnerabilities in Transmission Control Protocol/Internet Protocol (TCP/IP) processing." - Just because one certain piece of software isn't vulnerable to this attack vector, doesn't mean another wouldn't...

The bug(s) are still there, sounds like they are just searching for reasons not to fix them, FTFA...

While this was my original line of thinking, I'd have to also assume that the artist has his copy of the contract and it was gone over with a fine tooth comb before organizing the raid for this - especially against a corporate entity the size of Sony.

Even though it's all agreed here that Sony is going to find some way out out of this, it may still turn out to be a boon for the lowly citizen (world wide) as this as well may be able to be used as a precedent (not a legal one though) just in our favor - even though the laws are different, it comes down to the 'magic' math, and what Sony (RIAA) considers intent and potential profit.

IANAL, although from what I do understand is that the US legal system has little to do with the actual laws, and a heck of lot more on how well the given side argues (civil cases of course) - I wouldn't think it wouldn't be that much of a stretch to point out that the arguments used in their defense of this (Sony), would counter all the arguments used in their prosecution attempts. In other words, even though it's a different country, different laws, different way of doing things - they are still held to their word, and considered truthful - because of that, I would think it could be used as a good argument that they are making everything up, if it counters whats been said to be truthful else where.. There any lawyers on, that could verify one way or the other if this could be possible - not the outcome of the foreign case, but what is said under oath in the foreign case...

And thats the whole problem unfortunately, the fact that the U.S. is too dependent on the almighty $$$. Destroying your liver costs you $$$, in both obtaining the liquor and obtaining the resulting medical treatments. There is zero $$$ (all around) in smoking some homegrown free Cannabis, but there are major $$$ in fining and criminalizing you for smoking it. If we were to legalize Cannabis, it would take a big chunk of the $$$ out of the drug cartels world wide - which is desirable, although at the same time there would be the same (if not more) amount in $$$ taken away from the private companies contracted to 'help out' the government in these 'wars/battles' - whether it's in in IT contracts, manufacturing weapons, logistics, medical, testing, etc.. someone rich and powerful is going to loose out. Even if were made legal, and a huge tax added to it - the amount of $$$ it would cost you would drop so much, that the amount of $$$ in taxes would not offset how much is profitable - perhaps for the government it self it could come relatively close, but not for the private companies with the trickle down effect.

It's all about the $$$, and it's just to bad that we are so addicted to it - personally, I'm concerned that this country will have to go bankrupt and implode before this changes. Obama has already had to personally visit our largest creditor (China) and make the case that we are capable of paying our bills, as they are getting concerned about the amount of debt we are racking up and the ability to pay it off...

Kind of reminds me what they got the Universities around the country to start doing - it only took the top Universities with some major $$$ and legal weight/expertise behind them to actually stand up to them (IIRC) - from my understanding, at least the local ISD's neither has anything close to the $$$ nor the legal weight/expertise behind them... I'm not saying the Universities dumped a lot of money into fighting them, but it did take some serious legal expertise to even consider standing up to them - and it goes back to the ISD's having neither..

And the money is on theirs, which has a funny way of making/changing these laws...

I'd imagine that they were testing the major configurations of the company they were at, why test configuration X if it's not supported in the first place? Also, I'd be suspicious of the 'image', I've seen what is called an 'image' but in reality formating the drive and 'copying' files over to the new and blank fs.

I would suspect that the initial 'plan' was to start with the common hardware configuration and OS. Upgrade to Vista, make sure it's all good to go and then do the plunge with 7. They would have stuck with very few configurations because that is all that was used, and they opted for the upgrade so the 100's or 1000's of desktops won't loose data/settings of the end users - if you did that your company would come to stand still for at least a few hours and the helpdesk would be buzy for days.

Wouldn't that make it a felony for the companies using the service to get around the blocking? IE: masking, in a since, the real #? Blocking something isn't the same thing as pretending your something else - IE: masking.