I absolutely HATED to go outside and play ball games. Even at the age of 8 I was more interested in reading (we didn't have a computer or a game console). I can't understand parents who freak out when their children do not want to become playground bullies or basketball fanatics. Just make sure that your kids get enough actual excersize and buy them 64Gb iPad if that's what they like.

It's inert. Even if you put it on fire exactly nothing exciting is going to happen - explosives will simply melt, flow out of the casing and slowly burn.

You've misspelled 'NSA'...

They are improved, sure. But they are still CRAP, compared with OLED phone displays or good computer displays.

That's my problem as well. I have a fairly crappy 5-year-old 30" HDTV. I know it's crappy but that's OK, because I only use it to play an occasional casual game or watch a movie every couple of weeks. I checked newer TVs and they are all crappy, contrast ratio is mediocre, color performance is abysmal and manufacturers compete only on "see how we can make your TV to be a big-ass 60" panel!"

So I decided not to bother and wait for 4k panels. I don't care much about content, because I'll be using it mostly for games.

Nah, I'm happy to spend my money to buy new crap if it has some new and and interesting features. But why buy something that isn't any better?

23andMe already pioneered this!

Seriously, they have this feature.

Why replace perfectly fine 1080p HDTV? Newer ones often simply have more crap and more complicated UI with lots of "value-added" bloatware.

Oh, and my _phone_ has the same resolution as these 50" panels. Why the fuck he's talking about "image quality"? Until we get 4k displays the quality differences are non-existent.

Well, The Culture novels are just a tiny glimpse into a huge world. Millennia-spanning trillion-sized civilization is guaranteed to produce so much stories...

But maybe it's better to leave it as it is. New authors won't have the same ideas in mind when they develop their stories and we might get a fragmented universe.

I know people who developed complicated algorithms which model the actual physical geometry of the tapes to eliminate pre- and post-echoes to restore some archival records of early Soviet music performances.

IMO, digital is better than analog. Formats are not that complicated, just include a .txt file on each medium with short description of the format. Unless your format is designed by a complexity pervert it won't be complicated to write a translator for future digital archaeologists.

No, you couldn't. There are no recorded cases of hearing >21KHz, hearing range is limited by simple mechanics - the smallest hairs in your ears can vibrate only at a frequency so high.

What you were hearing is likely to be the first harmonic of the alarm, probably around 18-19KHz which indeed can't be heard by grown-ups.

Zimmerman had ability to retreat before the confrontation. He had no _duty_ to do it (that's SYG law). We might never know what happened, perhaps Zimmerman called Trayvon 'a fucking n...er' or threatened to shoot him on the spot.

Imagine that I walk into a bar and start a brawl with the biggest baddest meanie there, then I pull out my gun and shoot him. It appears to be totally legal under Florida's laws (well, I can be nicked for getting a weapon into a bar - that's a felony, btw). Should I be let go in this case? Now imagine that there is nobody in the bar at that time, so it's my word against corpse's. I'll even have bruises to prove that I was threatened!

That's why SYG laws are dumb and should be repealed. Civilians should certainly be able to use deadly force in self-defense (or in defense of other peoples' lives), or to protect their property ('castle doctrine') but that's it.

Other people in this thread pointed out that SYG laws indeed WERE considered in this case: http://slashdot.org/comments.pl?sid=4173251&cid=44779213

So I repeat, were these black boys left loose? Or were they arrested and are awaiting a trial, which will almost certainly find them guilty?

Oh, here's a real reverse Zimmerman case: http://www.thedailybeast.com/articles/2013/07/16/the-reverse-travyon-martin-case-and-the-other-george-zimmerman.html - a man in a car shot another man whom he deemed to be threating.

Were these black boys left loose once they claimed a "stand your ground" defense? No?

Thought so.

Then point it out. There is NO such testimony. None. Nada. Zilch. Nichego.

What we have are WORDS of Zimmerman and a witness' statement that she saw someone on top of someone. Maybe.