The article did not say the obstacle had to be in front of the ext. One example given was a pole 30 degrees to the right. By helping people to form lines in advance of the exit, this approach prevents a mash of bodies. This in turn may enable those with wheelchairs and walkers a chance of passing through instead of stopping up an exit.

I think there are public venues where this should be considered.

I love your optimism.

According to National Public Radio, the Bush-ERA CIA operated prisons that held more than 15,000 "secret" prisoners in more than a dozen nations including Poland and other European countries, Saudi Arabia and other Middle Eastern Countries, and countries from other areas of the globe as well.

Operating under the legal theory of "special or extra rendition," these individuals had (have?) no lawyers or contact with their families and were often tortured.

And that is only what has come to light thus far!

From Internet monitoring to cell phone records, the US' National Security Agency (NSA) monitors pretty much anything they want to world-wide.

Nothing in what I've noted thus far even touches on US public and secret cooperations with security services in Britain, Israel, Saudi Arabia, Poland, etc.

There is also the rarely examined "independent" companies that host law enforcement data and share with other organizations outside the scope of laws that prohibit such organizations from sharing such information or European laws that protect the privacy of the individual.

I stand by my previous posting:
In the end, the old advice still stands, "do not post anything that you would not want attributed to you on the evening news at the worst possible time and with the most unkind possible bias."

So that entire 195 word article was a link to a wikipedia page? Why on earth do we need a /. discussion about a Wikipedia page?

ALL OF THEM, except the one that links directly to your article about the best method for teaching kids to read. (Which apparently doesn't seem to exist.)

Come on, you have links to Google search results, Wikipedia pages, and the bio of someone who might have had something to do with it at some point but the link has *NOTHING* to do with the subject at hand.. and you don't know which links need to be culled?

The problem the Democrats are trying to solve IS how to insure everyone without drowning the country in debt or destroying the parts of the system that work.

Along the way, they have been quick to make changes and compromises (as of this writing, the end-of-life counseling originally proposed by the Bush administration and the "public option" so feared by the Health Insurance companies have been dropped). One reason for the flexibility is that the concerns raised by the Republicans and the "Blue dog" democrats about both financial viability and government intrusions have been acknowledged by the administration as legitimate.

A problem has been that no solution yet on the table seems to have enough votes to pass. The right wing fears that a system that successfully serves more than 250 million people may be wounded. The left wing fears being thrown out of power if the more than 50 million uninsured people are still uninsured when the next election happens.

An income tax surcharge that funds vouchers that private citizens could use to purchase private health insurance might work for everyone. (I think Australia has a similar approach.) That would remove employers from involvement in employee personal situations just as employers in this country are not involved in their employees' purchase of mortgages and car insurance. That would also create a larger market for private insurers to compete over.

The body of law that has evolved around the 1st amendment clearly provides different laws to different people depending on their role in society. The most commonly referred to categories are politicians, public figures, and private citizens.

The courts have found that the "public interest" related to finding things out about our politicians is so compelling, that one can say or publish almost any falsehood about them without fear of prosecution. The theory here is that the harm to such individuals (Can you say Swiftboat?" Sure, I knew you could,) is outweighed by the benefit of public revelations of government crimes. (arms-for-hostages, lies about opponents having Black-ops prisons, torture of prisoners, etc.)

People who are "merely" public figures (Paris Hilton, for example) actually do have more rights than politicians and are sometimes successful in suing those that have wronged them via slander or libel.

People who are generally accepted to be private citizens have even more rights as they are not perceived to have the resources or media exposure to correct falsehoods published about them. In addition, the law continues to evolve and for the last forty or so years, private US citizens do have some degree of a "right to privacy," although nowhere near the degrees of our brothers in Europe.

Internet anonymity exists only until people in authority decide to unmask it. While slash dot has hosted many a discussion about forwarding and posting services, none appear in the long run to be absolutely immune to eventual revelation.

The lesson here is simple: Whether you are a "whistle blower" of government or business abuse, a "wannabe" revealer of crime sources, or (apparently in this case) someone who desires to slander, libel, or otherwise defame someone without justification, you will remain anonymous only until someone in authority decides otherwise.

For those in this forum who use other examples of people who appear to have successfully used web anonymity, be cautious before drawing premature conclusions. After all, in any given case, who is to say that someone who thinks they have been anonymous for the last five years is not merely in the middle of a 6 to 10 year investigation that includes secret monitoring by federal authorities?

In the end, the old advice still stands, "do not post anything that you would not want attributed to you on the evening news at the worst possible time and with the most unkind possible bias."

I looked at Prius' since their introduction, but could never bring myself to pay the premium that hybrids command.

My 15 miles-per-gallon 1996 Ford Expedition might have lasted another thirteen years. Instead, I took the $4,500 incentive and bought a Prius. The Prius consumed 44.5 miles-per gallon in the 200 miles I drove in the last two days. (My daily commute is about a hundred miles and there is no public transport available.)

Hopefully, this subsidy by other taxpayers will result in lower gas prices for all as this program will lower overall gas demand immediately.

In addition, the incidence of respiratory diseases like asthma and emphysema might see a tiny improvement with the resulting lowering of emissions.

From a financial perspective, I am still taking a loss as the car payments and insurance exceed the gas savings by between $250 and $300 per month. Unless gas hits $5 a gallon, this adventure could be rationalized as a 50/50 venture between taxpayers and my family budget to stimulate the economy.

'They' in this case would be the American public. If the American public paid for a 'work for hire' then the American public owns it. Thats not to say that they necessarily have 'rights' to it.. but your arguement as it stands doesnt seem to qualify.

"It would be like if someone living paycheck-to-paycheck decided to tour the world. That isn't going to solve their financial problems its only going to make it worse (by spending a ton and not working)"

Well, not necessarily. This woman I know who goes by 'Nandra' has traveled around the globe, living paycheck to paycheck. She did it just to experience the world, never once did she really lack for anything, nor did she ever put herself into debt.

I hope not. "Do-gooders" in the US, Canada, and Britain spent two hundred years of experiments building "penitentiaries," often with disastrous results. (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Prison) The original thesis was that solitary confinement would not be punishment but rather an opportunity for reflection.

For most, the experience proved to be brutal as the pain and psychosis of communal prisons was LESS damaging than the damage resulting from trying to isolate mammals who have spent millions of years of evolution in social settings. We are social animals, like it or not.

That is not to say that most prisons, especially US state prisons are not often brutal and inhumane. It is to say that isolation appears to produce even worse results.

I hope I never go to prison. Conceptually, I like the IDEA of solitary confinement and think that I would personally do better in that environment. Even if it were my own choice, it would still not surprise any psychological professional when I went psychotic in the process.

Be careful of what you wish for.

For people with arthritic fingers or whose digits just tire after hours of intensive scrolling, there is no device I have found as good as the Logitech Trackman Marble (http://www.logitech.com/index.cfm/mice_pointers/trackballs/devices/4680&cl=us,en).

I have been offering this device to users for almost ten years. For some, it is uncomfortable for a day or two after which users become grateful disciples and permanent customers.

Scrolling can be accomplished using any finger with or without bending the finger.

I'm one of the people who works both on problem PCs and who supervises others who do.

When working on a PC, "snooping" is the last thing I've got time or interest in doing.

However, if I install or update software (anything from a video editor to the latest version of word) and test it using the "recent files" list, you are crazy if you think I'm not going to call the police if I see something about the user being a terrorist or other kind of a criminal.

For those of you concerned about privacy laws, I think back to when I was in graduate school learning about counseling. A counselor is obligated by law (at least in Connecticut, New York, and New Jersey,) to call the authorities if the person being counseled reveals that he or she is contemplating or in the act of harming themselves or others. That applies even after promising confidentiality. (Ignore the misinformation you see so often on TV cop shows.)

I think the same principle applies here. If I work on your PC, I am obligated to keep secret your legitimate business secrets. As a matter of fact, you can and should sue me if I make public that kind of information. But reveal to me that you are a threat to yourself or others and I promise you a call to the authorities.

Restrictions on social networking may be an example of the "new" technology-driven world reflecting what has always been policy at many large companies.

Thirty years ago, my boss forced me to fire someone who was a member of a social group (outside of work that) my boss found to be objectionable. Mind you, this employee never opened his mouth or said anything unprofessional at work.

My boss took me aside and explained to me that like it or not, every employee's "personal life" could always be construed as a representation of the employer and so any publicly controversial image was grounds for termination.

What I found out then and is even more true in the US today, is that as long as your reason for firing someone is not directly based on their age, race, officially recognized religion, country of national origin, or recognized handicap, that you can pretty much fire them for any other reason (or non-reason), work-related or not.

Some of the freedoms for the "pursuit of happiness" in the US are reserved for the unemployed and entrepreneurs.

I accepted this reality early in my career. It is not the bravest position. Then again, I am not the bravest of people.

Q&A for DOS was the best non-relational database of the pre-windows era. (Ok, so PSF/File and Alpha4 had their fans too.) When I needed to load a copy of Q&A to retrieve some old Q&A data, every version of the Windows Dos box would lock the system up. The early versions of DOS/Box would also crash on Q&A's nasty habit of directly accessing system video.

However, for the last three years (at least), DOS/Box now loads Q&A and at least the Q&A search and export features work just fine.

This is one fine product.