From what I've read after posting, Experian bought a company that was selling SSNs to thieves and didn't do due diligence when buying it. So maybe a fine, but nobody from Experian will go to prison.

I went through bankruptcy shortly after my divorce, and it looks to me like you have nothing to lose by it, talk to a good lawyer. As soon as your lawyer files the papers you are prohibited by law from paying bills until the court proceedings are finished, which takes a while. You don't pay rent, utilities, any debts at all and they can't shut off your utilities and your landlord can't evict you. Trying to collect from you is a felony.

After the proceedings are finished, trying to collect any debt from before the bankruptcy from you is also a felony.

Once your bankruptcy is done you will be inundated with credit card offers, because they know you can't file again for 7 years.

See a lawyer, talking to one is free.

I wonder when they started that, then?

I got mine in 1968, and it said in large caps FOR TAX PURPOSES ONLY. It would be damned hard to write a book without a credit card now -- copyright, ISBN, web site, printer... pretty hard to do any commerce online without a card.

I've spent over $300 on Nobots, all of it on the card. (OT but it might be available as early as next week, I'll let you guys know).

and that presumably, there is a separate argument to be made for Experian having the right to ever sell the information at all.

And what, pray tell, would that argument be? I can see nothing whatever society gains by letting Experian sell what they do not own.

For fuck's sake, it has nothing to do with obamacare. Stay on topic and stop trolling.

OK, so they put the ID theft guy in prison, how about having Experian's CEO in an adjoining cell? Why is it legal for Experian to sell my SS#??? I never gave them permission for that.

Equating "free" with "not good" is pretty damned stupid if you ask me. Air? Rain? How about the interstate vs a toll road? Home grown tomatoes vs the cardboard ones you buy at the grocery store?

Of course, like anyone else, there are a lot of really stupid English speakers (but no dumber than folks speaking other languages).

They were talking about this yesterday on the farming show that comes on early Sunday mornings. Farmers don't burn; you lose carbon and nutrients that way. What they do is after harvesting, they chop up what's left of the plants and let it rot in the fields, the microorganisms break it down.

I believed "Markdown and Pandoc" to be a work of 16th century French literature. By Alcofribas Nasier, is it not?

I never heard of them, either. Markdown is certainly not a tool used by nerds; nerds write their own HTML in a text editor, any one is as good as another. Wikipedia has never heard of Pandoc, either. Pity, I might have use of that but if it's too obscure for Wikipedia, well...

Both you and the AC above are wrong. The AC is wrong because his definition disagrees with every dictionary out there. Yours is wrong because you're not looking deeply enough. You say "No, they're pathetic. There shouldn't be a single point of failure for anything in one's life." How about your food? Without tractors, combines, and other advancements in the last century there wouldn't be enough food for everyone.

Write a letter? Do you know how to make paper?
Ride a bike or take a bus? Those are both machines. As is a kerosine lamp, all technology. We all rely on machines.

And it's certainly not pathetic to rely on an implanted CrystaLens when you were extremely nearsighted all your life and couldn't get by without those older technologies, contacts and glasses.

As a practical matter, you are "locked in" to whatever Office program you use - online or otherwise

But why are people locking themselves into a closed, proprietary format that is way too expensive when there is a free version that's every bit as good (actually better since Oo doesn't have that god damned stupid ribbon bullshit I have to put up with at work)

It frustrates the hell out of me. Word 2007 is not compatible with Word 2003, which is not compatible with Word 98. And Word is not available on all platforms. But after obtaining 10 IDBNs I was contacted via snail spam (a postcard) from a printer. Microsoft Word or PDF. Same with the ISBN people, Word or PDF. Lulu, Word or PDF. I hate Word! I'll be so glad when I retire next year!

This insistence on using Microsoft pisses me off. ODF is OPEN, people. It should be the standard.

Wikipedia backs him up.

1.2 billion living Catholics, as well as all the Catholics in the last 2000 years. Note that when the present Pope was a Bishop in South America, he refused the large suite the church offered and lived in a small apartment in the poor part of town.

That said, I disagree with a lot of Catholic teachings and practices. I'm not Catholic, just generic Christian.

You got me interested since it seems I'm wrong. Apparently my definition came from this

The Chimera (/kÉËmÉÉ(TM)rÉ(TM)/ or /kaÉËmÉÉ(TM)rÉ(TM)/, also Chimaera, Chimæra; Greek: ÎÎμαÎÏα ChÃmaira) was, according to Greek mythology, a monstrous fire-breathing creature of Lycia in Asia Minor, composed of the parts of three animals â" a lion, a snake and a goat. Usually depicted as a lion, with the head of a goat arising from its back, and a tail that ended in a snake's head,[1] the Chimera was one of the offspring of Typhon and Echidna and a sibling of such monsters as Cerberus and the Lernaean Hydra.

I predate this by a long while; when I was young, such a thing didn't exist. I was a year old when the double helix was discovered, 16 when "The Double Helix: A Personal Account of the Discovery of the Structure of DNA" was published by James Watson, and was in the USAF when Paul Berg created the first recombinant DNA molecules by combining DNA from the monkey virus SV40 with that of the lambda virus. Strange that I never ran across that use of the term since they've used donated organs (at least experimentally with animals) all my life.

New use of an old word, thank you for the education! I know a fellow with both a donated liver and donated corneas. He has an artificial knee so he's both chimera and cyborg.