While it's relatively new compared to everything on this list, the AMD Opteron, which came out in 2003, will be the face of computing for the foreseeable future. Even now in 2009 AMD's archival Intel is just coming out with integrated memory controllers and high-speed serial direct interconnects. The Opteron also forced Intel to give everyone 64-bit memory addressing in x86 (which Intel wanted to stay in the realm of high-end RISC/Itanium machines).

Opteron wasn't the first chip to have any of these features, but it was the first _x86_ chip to have all of them - making it an affordable "high-end" processor for small businesses and tech junkies. It really was a "world-shaking" product that put AMD on the map. No one expected little AMD to make a splash so big with Opteron (except Intel, which paid off companies to not release Opteron-based products, a55holes!).

What I've heard is the band thought the GH version is what's on the cd. Having the band come out and say the cd version is in any way "defective" would constitute a PR nightmare and people demanding recall & replacement of their discs. So they've spun it as "the cd version is what we (the band) wanted" so their label doesn't lose money due to the label's mastering mistake.

He did it b/c he couldn't figure out how to get the Guitar Hero version onto his PC himself. He was fed up with the static-laden "loudness war" version that's on the audio compact disc and this was his only avenue.

At least that's what I'd like to think as it's the funniest scenario in my mind.

Yeah, the big accomplishment of the US is doing all of that while keeping the rest of the economy going, ie food on the table. The USSR channeled everything into space/military R&D for short term gain but in the end we all know how that worked out. The USSR was kind of like the morons I see sprinting at the beginning of a 10k run that then get passed up somewhere in the first couple miles and eventually finish walking.

From psychology classes I've taken I believed the same thing - right up until having children of my own. I have two boys, one at 3 years and one 3 mos. The 3-yr-old has a female cousin that is only a few weeks younger. We've watched the two of them grow up side-by-side and seen how they appear to gravitate to male and female gender roles, respectively, with little prodding. ESB was on tv one day last summer and the boy sat up on the couch, watched the whole thing w/o leaving his seat. He noticed some of my old action figures in the basement one day and the rest is history (yeah, I know some of the material may be inappropriate for a 3-yr-old). When his cousin came to visit he wanted her to watch ESB with him, she got all excited, and was then disappointed and playing with her "girl" toys a few minutes in. Some of it just seems innate...

If you did RTFA, you missed the point. The idea is to use this on people for whom death is imminent. For example, a man suffering a heart attack. As the person "dies" you try to put him into suspended animation so the tissue never goes through "death". Once the patient is in suspended animation you have time to perform whatever surgical procedure necessary and then attempt revival. Other cases mentioned in which this will be used is severe bleeding - DARPA hopes it can be used to save soldiers who would otherwise have bled out and died.