Same here. I deliberately did NOT go with ATT. I guess I should have gone with Sprint or Verizon.

To me, inherent value is something that I can use directly. Such as food and clothing. Petroleum, at least unrefined, is not much direct use. So, if society is to collapse as some have said, I think MREs would be a good idea. They keep basically forever and can be used to say alive. Or maybe guns and ammo. Can't be used directly, but can be used to get what is needed - if you're that type of person. "Gold won't get you good mercenaries. But good mercenaries will get you gold!"

My machines belong to me. The stuff on them is mine, not the company's. And I don't want any confusion about that. I have VPN access from home to the corporate LAN. We also have a Windows "work at home" server which is accessible via MS's mstsc. I use that, not the VPN/LAN. I use Linux at home and rdesktop to access that server. Once on that server, I use mstsc to access my work desktop. Why? it makes my home machine safer. My home machine is more of a "dumb terminal" which cannot be infected by or infect anything at work. Or at least it is significantly less likely. I'm not aware of any virus which can spread over an mstsc link. Which means little, given my ignorance. My home system is behind a firewall/router, so hopefully it is too much trouble to crack. I don't need "impossible", just need "harder than average" to discourage most. Running Linux and no Windows also helps.

maybe so. But that's one reason I like Linux for my desktop. It makes me a smaller target. Even though, in my heart of hearts, I believe that a "as distributed" good Linux distro is more resistant than a "standard" MS version of Windows (with no add on security, virus scanners, et al). But, in this case, both sides simply are opinion because a true test (i.e. using real hackers attacking a real user's system) is simply not possible.

Though I personally prefer my Linux/KDE to my Mac Mini, I have a friend who __used to be__ a Windows partisan. Until he was forced to get a Mac laptop. Now he is in love with the Mac instead of Windows. It is a nice system. And nowhere near as vulnerable as an average Windows system.

Which is why I like sudo /sbin/halt . On Linux, of course. That says: "I'm god and you're dead!"

I agree with you. In the extreme, it might lead to gas pedals sticking in computer controlled cars. Oh, wait, that's already been done.

did you mean "bullish projection" or "bullshit projection"???

NO, NO, NO. BP does not owe anybody anything. The residents of the states owe BP for the oil that their land is illegally impeding from being delivered to Europe via a non standard shipping method!

I f you don't like Java's multithreading, give Erlang a look. An interesting functional programming language.

Yes, I've heard of Clojure. I have even read this book and enjoyed it. But I am a bit of a dilettante when it comes to programming languages. I've read a good number of the books from Pragmatic and like them. I especially like that they are PDF and DRM-free. Of course, each book is unique in that it is water marked on each page with my name. I've not used the language myself for anything other than "playing around". I also like Groovy and Scala, which are also JVM based languages which makes it easy to inter-operate with them.

The worst way to manage your money is to spend like mad with no correlation to income.

Wait a minute! Doesn't the US Government have a "business method" patent on this?

Yes. Patents apply to some of the z architecture. You cannot make "something" (either hardware or software) which implement the patented architecture, regardless of how you implement it.

Every company which is in business to make a profit can turn "evil". Especially when they become "owned" by people who care only about money, with no sense of ethics. Good is defined as "anything which increases my store of money". Bad is defined as "anything which decreases my store of money". IOW, most people are simply greedy and selfish.