The modern commercial Internet exploded onto the scene in 1995 becoming ubiquitous by 1999. Before that was NSF version of the Internet that nowadays is known as a "research educational network" or REN.

It was the public, commercial Internet which was missing from the Matrix's 1999. They didn't email. No web was browsed. It just wasn't there.

You're right, Morpheus did say, "You believe it's the year 1999 when in fact it's closer to 2199."

Nevertheless, the technology was wrong for 1999. The tech inside the Matrix was deliberately retro, even for its release date.

That was in the Matrix Reloaded. Released in 2003. Four years later.

So was I. Because I had access through my school. The Internet as a commercial venture with public awareness happened in 1995.

They entered and exited with "hard lines," aka plain old telephones. Inside they communicated with cell phones. Not, SMS or email, cell phones.

Says who? The movie didn't specify the year and the tech inside the matrix was somewhere between 1989 and 1994, not 1999. It was already dated when the movie was released, and intentionally so.

How do I know it was before 1995? There was no Internet inside the matrix.

U.S. courts are not fans of anything resembling a Bill of Attainder.

Thank you. That was my question and you answered it.

Don't you run into quantum limits at some point where the circle can no longer be perfectly circular causing further precision in Pi to fail to reflect the actual object?

I have no problem with Steam. Steam is both a publisher and a retailer. When you're talking books, the publisher and retailer between them keep north of 80% of the sale price with the authors getting less than 20%. And that's fine. It's competitive, and if you hate all the publishers you can even self-publish.

The difference between Apple and Steam is that Apple is a monopoly. If you don't want to use the apple store, there's no other legitimate process to sell your app to iPhone users. They can set any rates they want, they can refuse any apps they don't like and they routinely do so.

Hey, I saved $1000 bagging groceries to buy a hard drive for my Commodore 128, so I get where you're coming from. But that was in 1988. By '91 it was plain that except for game consoles the future held little room for machines that weren't pc compatible.

You bought an Apple II series machine in 1991. The answer must have been: yes.

The Apple IIgs was a fine machine... in 1986. By 1989 the whole Apple II series was on its way out, and it wasn't even a little bit ambiguous.

Then I guess I'm glad I refused the Thomas test and walked away.

I have a theory: if a company is arbitrarily rigid about something that's completely in their control, they'll be arbitrarily rigid about many things. That rigidity makes for an unpleasant workplace. So, during the application process it's worth identifying one thing about which they express rigidity and challenging them to modify it.

Before the pandemic, my test was usually to ask for a private office. Four walls and a door. They don't have to say yes, but the ones who offer a hell no have failed my test. I didn't even have to get that far with Canonical. They handed me a rigidity test on a silver platter.

This method has failed me only once in my career. In that case, the company simply lied to me: they made a promise that they never fulfilled.

I once applied to work for Canonical. Prior to offering an interview, they insisted I take the computer version of something called the Thomas International General Intelligence Assessment.

The problem with the computer version of the test is that they show you an image of something for a few moments, then they remove it from the screen and ask you questions about what you saw. If you're Aphantasic, as I am, the test is essentially impossible. I don't have a visual memory. My brain isn't wired that way. Remove something from my sight and the only questions I can answer about it are the things I happened to notice at the time.

I asked for an ADA accommodation. Maybe take the paper version test which doesn't have this problem. Not a chance. You take the test which every applicant takes or you don't get an interview. Period. Full stop. Goodbye.

That's my thought as well. The company with all its rocketry assets has $18M in cash, $17M in debt and they're buying it outright for another $17M. Unless their assets are pure vapor, that's a heck of a bargain.