IDEs for code seem to be the only user interfaces F/OSS folks seem to know a lot about -- off the top of my head, there are Vim or Emacs (take your pick -- I like them both.), BlueFish, Eclipse, and on the more specific sides we have the Qt designer, IDLE, and I'm sure Dia fits in there somewhere.

The catch -- of course -- is that most of these UIs feel very logical, but not very intuitive. They're great once you get used to them; but I doubt the average Flash "programmer" will want to use Emacs any time soon. So I guess in the end, you're probably right. It's probably up to the corps to produce the popular, decent IDEs. ;)

Javascript is a great invention, and as its speed improves, many arguments against its use are resolved. But, from what I can see, the two major ones (accessibility, and shrinking devices) that I see today are still quite valid, mostly independent of how efficient JavaScript can be.

Accessibility -- as more JavaScript is used, the site becomes ever more pointy-clicky and ever less static. To us mouse users, that's probably not a major issue. However, I know two people who can't use a mouse -- one of them is my father, who is paraplegic due to M.S., and relies on Dragon to use a computer at all. It's pitiful watching him struggle with flash- and javascript-heavy sites, because he simply can't tell the mouse to "go there" without most of a minute of effort. Granted, this isn't the majority of users. But it's an important enough minority that sites really should reconsider how much they depend on javascript. (Google's homepage is actually an example of how scripting can be used while leaving the site accessible. It adds flair to the homepage, and lets the menus function, but navigating the site by keyboard alone is still feasible.)

Mobility -- devices are getting smaller. We have iPhones and Netbooks today, which have small screens. Although they can run JavaScript, manipulating a site that builds a complex UI around it can be difficult (especially when it's a large page and things pop up all over the place). Even if the processing power weren't limited, the gaining popularity of these devices seems like a good incentive to keep scripting to a minimum.

I'm probably just a bit biased from the first reason above, but while I'm not against JavaScript, I don't think it's the way of the future -- flexible though it is, it's still got its fair share of problems, completely unrelated to its speed. Static, or at least mostly-static, pages don't have those associated problems.

No, but I would expect a few to say "I saw them, but it was too late to miss them." In cases where this was probably the case, I'd bet most people would still say "I didn't see them."

I actually do this off and on, but the problem isn't a lacking market but rather a lack of time. Safeway is some pocket change I can get for relatively few hours between homework and sleep, but academic necessities frequently don't leave me enough time in the day to really pursue the idea as a business (yet).

Thanks for the suggestions, though. :)

(Of course, this whole thing is offtopic as well.)

At least around the Seattle area, my experience has been that Comcast in particular is unwilling to budge on the 250Gb limit unless and until you get a business account, regardless of living in a house with a geek, a hardcore gamer, and at least two people who have replaced TV with Hulu. I keep bandwidthd running, and we (luckily) have Qwest as an option, because we *regularly* overshoot 250Gb in a month between us.

I have a chat log from when I decided to verify this as evidence that we should stick with Qwest a few months ago. When asked the question, the representative plainly said that residential customers cannot raise that limit. Although it's just one representative, the plainness and rapidity with which they answered the question would seem to me a sign that they get the question often.

I wouldn't have a problem with transfer caps by ISPs *if* there was actually competition. But I have a choice of exactly 3 providers here: Qwest, Comcast, and Clearwire. Clearwire is nice, but it's got a top speed of 2Mbps. Qwest has a horrendous billing department. And Comcast has the transfer limit. There is no real competition here -- so you don't really get to choose your bandwidth cap (if Qwest and Clearwire were to start imposing them, it would become a very tenuous situation for my household).

Competition drives services up and prices down. We don't have competition here, so the ISPs need to be strong-armed into decency. Also worth noting is an obvious conflict of interests which should bring to significant question the real motives behind the limits in the first place.

I've tried to explain this difference to people before. I'm not sure whether it's because mass media got to them first, or whether it's just too complex for someone who's never seen a velocity graph to understand, but it seems that "volume" used in this way is too complicated, and "amount of data" means close to nothing to someone who can't tell the difference between RAM and hard disk storage.

At the moment, I work at Safeway. Living in a decently close-knit area of town means that I see people who know that I'm "the computer guy", and it never ceases to amaze me the depths of ignorance which most people live in about technology. Just yesterday, I had someone ask me what a "four-gigabyte laptop" means. I assume they meant RAM, but it shouldn't take much to understand why that statement is meaningless, even at a layman's level (Four gigabytes of *what*?).

For what it's worth, I have pondered a modified definition of bandwidth to encompass rate and quantity. Something like a velocity vector, which includes not only the direction, but also the magnitude, bandwidth could be considered a vector quantity with both a rate (Mbps) and a magnitude (250Gb). It makes sense to me, as these quantities are closely related. Mainstream media has apparently adopted similar nomenclature (such as Comcast allowing 54Mbps for 250Gb), and one could extrapolate that the absolute value, i.e. the scalar quantity, would still match the traditional definition of bandwidth (and, again, this would go nicely with Comcast first saying that they give you 54Mbps).

You cannot prove that something does not exist (unless it is a contradictory definition, such as a 4-sided triangle). You can't prove that something will always occur, either. Both of these are a result of the problem of induction.

However, asking to prove that God doesn't exist is asking the wrong question. Those who believe in God have the burden of proof, as they are asserting a positive claim. Those who withhold belief until suitable evidence is presented (i.e. atheists, most agnostics) are following the scientific method (and proper inductive reasoning) to a tee.

Those who state unequivocally that God does not exist are falling for the same logical fallacy as those who ask us to prove that He doesn't.

As for the claim that atheists don't take God seriously: I am an atheist, and I take the proposition very seriously. It's a matter of my eternal fate, of either non-existance or some form of afterlife. It is //because// I take the claim so seriously that I demand the highest standard of evidence; anything less and I'm playing with fate.

I thought I'd chime in as a fellow icon-view aficionado. Of course, it all depends on use case. But for sparking some conversation, here's a few cases where I *definitely* prefer icon view over list view:

- A collection of pictures ("pict001.jpg" and "pict1757.jpg" may as well be the same image to me, until I see it, although being in a folder certainly helps narrow it to at least a topic)
- A collection of videos (although a name is probably useful for full-length movies, home movies and youtube downloads are frequently not named, but rather numbered.)
- My home folder (after much trial of all methods, that's what I've found I prefer.)

And some cases where I definitely prefer list view and/or a shell over icon view:
- A collection of source files (Text icons are all but indistinguishable)
- A collection of MP3s (There's nothing to see, and having lots of names, or better yet, the structure of the folders, visible is useful.)

That's really what I do, on a daily basis, and it just adds a little more weight to your point that really, all 3 views (list, icon, tree) have their use case.

As an additional aside, corporations/companies/groups need to be able to patent because many research topics simply can't be handled by individual. Consider medical patents or new methods of silicon fabrication. These are insanely expensive to research (probably for different reasons), such that no individual could reasonably expect to do so. As a result, only companies have enough money, and in that case, no one individual is responsible for the patent.

I graduated from high school this summer (protracted slightly by my concurrent enrollment at a local community college). At least at my high school, a touch-typing course was required. And having been through it, I can say that nobody should be required to take a course where multiple equal possibilities exist.

For me, I learned to touch-type on Qwerty as a child, but I switched to Dvorak when I was about 12. After 4 years of typing exclusively on dvorak keyboards (and typing more in those 4 years than I probably ever typed any time before that), my fingers had significant muscle memory. Today, I can barely touch a Qwerty keyboard. Dvorak was an alternative, and I chose that alternative -- and it works equally well to Qwerty (so, unlike mathematics, where only correct methods give correct answers, touch-typing would have to be less than universally applicable: everybody would learn Qwerty, most likely, even if everybody doesn't use qwerty)

I had to take a typing test and get 30wpm to graduate. I implored them that I could type at about 60wpm on a dvorak keyboard, and in 5 mouse clicks I could switch the keyboard over (and wouldn't even need a different physical keyboard) and pass the test on the first try, without having to take the course. They refused this of me, and while I practiced for a couple of weeks on Qwerty to pass the test, it took me several months to undo the damage to my muscle memory, so that I could type at 60wpm again without wondering whether the comma was at the top-left or bottom-right of the keyboard. To me, at least, this mandatory typing test was a severe impediment to my studies.

I don't pretend I'm not in a minority -- Dvorak is used by probably less than 5% of typists in America. But what if you grew up in Germany, and used a German keyboard? When you came to America in your mid-teens to attend high school, you would be in almost the same situation (and I'm sure a great majority of Germans who type use a German keyboard, not a Qwerty keyboard).

So, although it's certainly amusing to think of layout wars in the near future, it's probably going to be the reality for some students. A reality that doesn't make any sense anyway -- keyboards are something you learn by doing, and these days there are a growing number of other input devices to deal with (voice recognition is available, cell phones, the frogpad, etc.) -- learning to touch-type may not even be useful to someone who plans to use voice recognition for the rest of their career.

This is just a simple matter of accommodating students with differing needs. A mandatory touch-typing class where the student could choose any keyboard layout they desired (or, better yet, choose any input *device* they desired) would be just fine. A mandatory touch-typing class where the student is locked into a technology that is possibly difficult or alien to them, and one which they possibly will never use again (even if it is in a small minority of cases) is just not acceptable. This isn't math; this is touch-typing. Muscle memory for the students who learned a different keyboard first means that trying to teach them a new keyboard layout will, in fact, harm their productivity, not help it.

Just my $0.02 :)

Well, for one thing, self-driving vehicles aren't 100% applicable. They probably won't deal as well with emergency situations or difficult driving conditions, for example. That would require much more research to make a machine superior to a human. At the very least, this means there will need to be a manual operation mode for unusual circumstances. Personally, if the driver only takes over in emergencies or heavy snow, they're not going to have practiced enough beforehand to handle that anyway -- so, automated drivers are bad drivers, and automated cars probably won't be able to completely replace humans for all situations in any near future.

They also remove a significant pleasure for many people. I don't find a lot of pleasure in driving, but a lot of people do -- why do you think luxury cars and nascar wound up so popular? Simple. Driving can be fun. A machine removes some of the "fun factor" from driving down the road.

Finally, there is cost. A cheap, used car costs less than a fancy self-driving car. It's going to be a long time, even *after* self-driving cars are introduced, before they become the majority of cars. Futuristic wishes aside, lots of people already own gas-consuming manually-steered cars, and most won't just go out there to buy a new one. In the mean time, we need laws that keep the roads safe while we're still stuck with manual cars.

In summary: Sure, automatic cars would be nice. They don't (yet) exist, so the goal of safety means implementing laws. That's what lawmakers and policemen can do. While funding automated cars would be nice, it's not going to change the fact that we need safe driving laws.

More than once in this comment list, people have talked about returning books, used book stores, whatnot, and mentioned that Amazon would need some sort of deletion to allow this to happen. You know what? I don't really care whether Amazon can refund my books or not. I can't always return a book to Barnes and Noble, either (time I've owned it and damage caused to it by me are factors).

But the bottom line here is that the ability to return something is based on the physical world and the non-duplicability of items therein. Although I refuse to give up any of the advantages of digital content over physical content by submitting myself to DRM, I *am* willing to give up certain perks of physical items for digital items -- in particular, refunds and returns are untenable in an information society.

There is precedent. When you buy an album from Amazon's MP3 store, you get a 20-second or so sample from which to decide whether you want the album. However, you download the album, and there are no returns, no refunds, no re-downloads even. And, by the way, that is a perfectly acceptable arrangement, because the songs have no DRM -- it's the perfect digital transaction.

A similar situation for books could apply. No DRM, no returns, no refunds. I see no problem with this setup. It worked for music, why not books?

So, two things come to mind here.

First, what you're saying is that we shouldn't be able to take full advantage of all the added benefits of digital content. See, with a physical book, I can read it and lend it out or sell it. I can't keep a backup copy in case it gets dropped in the tub. I can't search it for keywords (easily). I can't expand it to fit an indefinitely large number of notes per page. Ad infinitum -- digital content is simply more flexible than physical content.

You seem to be suggesting that this should be stifled. The content providers should be provided with a guarantee that customers can't exceed the boundaries previously set by physical books. But this is nonsense: the limits on books are there inherently, because the technology (printing) doesn't have the capability to do the other things. When you *have* that capability, then to restrict it is a restriction, not a benefit.

The second thing that comes to mind is that you seem to think DRM can be transparent to honest customers. I must argue against this. We could look at fringe markets if you want (Linux users rarely get the DRM software, and of course it's never open source. What if someone creates a new OS and it isn't as popular as Linux? They're out of luck, right?). But I think that mainstream markets also exemplify the problem. Say you have a system where I can sell an e-book to my neighbor. You revoke my license and provide him a license. Somehow, whether it's through a website or a piece of software, I must perform some additional action to sell my copy above and beyond handing them a CD with the file on it. In that situation, I believe that no DRM, no matter how unobtrusive it is when reading the book, can remain hidden. Compare this to either a physical book or a non-DRM e-book. In either case, the only task I have to sell it is to transfer my copy in any suitable way to the person I'm selling it to.

A related problem is that of fair use. Parody is provided as a fair use. As is classroom use, and others (I'll let you look up fair use, but the basic idea here is that copyright is not an absolute right, but a privilege bestowed by the state to encourage authors and artists to make more books and art). With a tape or non-DRM'd music, I can remix and parody, use it in a classroom, or anything else. Of course, illegal activities are possible, but that is just a fact and nothing can be done about it except to sue someone who does something illegal with it (the RIAA seems to have figured at least this much out). For books, taking notes on the margins in a digital situation probably requires modifying the file. This is perfectly allowed under copyright (for software, you may have problems with the EULA, but even that is of questionable legal value). I believe, from both past experience and some thought experiments, that any DRM system that has any effect at all cannot permit such uses by either logical, legal, or practical necessity.

The burden of proof is on you now -- show me a DRM system, even hypothetical, that could remain hidden to the end user, open source, and still allow the continuation of the first sale doctrine, remixing and parody, and other fair uses. (Because this is exactly what I get without DRM)

If you have to keep them honest, they're not honest.

DRM *might* stop ignorant, potential gamers from grabbing a free copy. It's not because they're honest, it's because they don't know how to get around the DRM (yet).

On the other hand, if you actually have an honest customer (which wouldn't be so hard to find or keep if the DRM and other crap were dropped), you won't need to keep them honest, because they already are.

DRM restricts honest customers and does not deter anybody else who has any competency at all.

This doesn't make it any better.

Microsoft could easily do that - and they could also easily cover such a nasty activity by claiming some criminal investigation or what have you would benefit. "Save the children!" attracts politicians to do all sorts of things that are stupid and unnecessary. Customers would be pissed, rightfully (except, of course, the customers who are too ignorant to realize what's going on).

But Linux isn't as susceptible to that problem. It's completely invulnerable to it if you feel like auditing the code before compiling/installing. I suppose it's possible (albeit unlikely) that a Debian package or RPM package could have such a trojan (being binary software in any event), but I know of no examples of this offhand. And you can still find the source code if you think there's a problem.

This is just another reason not to use proprietary software -- not an excuse for Amazon.