I am lazy :) http://everything2.com/title/A+good+programmer+is+a+lazy+programmer

Anyway, I did look up the Monsanto article on wikipedia (more laziness). The Indian suicide claims have been debunked by the International Food Policy Research Institute. Hence, FUD.

[citation needed], otherwise it just looks like extreme FUD to a neutral observer, e.g. me.

They now offer Google Earth Pro (http://www.google.com/enterprise/earthmaps/earth_pro.html) instead.

(I will say 10 "Hail Stallmans" tonight to repent).

So accept the more expensive machine, sell it, and buy an iphone or whatever it is you want. Profit?!?! (Something like that, right?)

1) Don't buy a closed-source system filled with DRM next time.

Tada! Problem solved. Profit is optional.

Fair enough, I meant it's a crime under the Communications Act; it's a provision the Government can get rid of without affecting any other "crime".

Just wanted to quash the myth that the BBC's funding is independent of the Government, as pleasant as that myth might be :) Thanks for sharpening up my argument.

Indeed, but that's not a point you made.

How did you quote me making it then? I am merely supplementing my original points which still stand.

I believe that laws have been passed by a legitimately elected government that make it a crime.

That's very interesting, but that doesn't my question; I wasn't discussing the rights and wrongs of the licence, only the facts concerning it. You agree it is a crime. That's all I wanted to know, because you also said

No. You'll pay a fine. The government won't even prosecute you. |it will be a private prosecution by TV Licensing.

which is ambiguous as to whether it's a crime or not. I'm sorry I misinterpreted you.

Let me repeat: I was only concerned with the statement made earlier, not by you, that

the government is not involved in the collection of the license [sic] fee

The poster who wrote that has had the good sense not to argue with me. Let me make it clear for you: the licence fee is a tax which right now is mandated by the Communications Act 2003. How is the Government *not* more intimately involved in the collection of the licence fee than, say, when you agree to pay for groceries at the supermarket?

I was responding to the statement of your GP, viz. "the government is not involved in the collection of the license [sic] fee", which is demonstrably false. Are you disputing this, despite what I just said? Also, the licence fee ends up in the Government's Consolidated Fund, which is then disbursed to the BBC as the Government has deemed necessary.

Also, just because you brought it up: do you disagree that not paying the television licence fee is a crime? I would love to hear your justification for that one.

This issue is already complicated enough, so at minimum we need to make sure we are dealing only with facts.

Right, so if I don't pay the licence fee I won't be committing a crime and spending time in a Government-funded prison... Oh, wait, I will, because of Government-mandated laws (http://www.tvlicensing.co.uk/aboutus/legislation.jsp).

And now there is discussion by the Government about who the licence fee should go to through a process of "top-slicing" (http://www.culture.gov.uk/reference_library/minister_speeches/6180.aspx/) [which, by the way, Murdoch Jr. agreed with the BBC in opposing because he doesn't want the Government to gets its fingers in more pies; I guess he's not such a rent-seeker after all].

And it's not like the Government decides every so often how much the TV licence should cost. Except, of course, it does.

Please think and check before you post.

Can I mod the "Insightful" mod as "Funny"? Meta-moderation never seemed so tempting.

Wow, it actually worked! There's always a first time for Slashdot.

I can confirm this. It's why I moved to openSUSE, whose KDE 4.1 is actually pretty decent.

So... what exactly is your point? If you think that Last.fm radio is not worth 3 a month, then don't sign up to it. All the other stuff on their site is still free...

Would you have preferred the Pandora solution of just cutting you off? That is the choice here.

You're angry at the wrong people. Last.fm don't want this; the record labels do.

Wow, thanks for the extreme FUD. May I spoil it a little with some bona fide facts? Just two, if it's alright with you:

1) You don't need to get involved with the mildly difficult TeX syntax; you can just use lyx (free in both senses) or Scientific Word (free in neither).

2) Elsevier do accept LaTeX submissions, or at least PDF printouts, for all their journals, because they even have pages *on their own website* dedicated specifically to LaTeX, at http://www.elsevier.com/latex. Other publishers (including Springer!) who accept LaTeX submissions can be found here: http://www.ccrnp.ncifcrf.gov/~toms/latex.html#tex-latex_publishers

I won't bother to discuss the irrelevance of the ubiquity of Microsoft Word that you mention nor that -- gosh! -- Word allows for templating and referencing, which as you well know LaTeX can handle much more gracefully.

You write pompously without the requisite backing of facts which would make it acceptable. No-one will deny that LaTeX has a steeper learning curve than Microsoft Word, at least initially, but your whole post reeks of trollness with its misrepresentation of the facts.