Military drones, armed and dangerous, operating software resulting from IP theft?

Heh... I'd love to see the Business Software Alliance go after these guys... :-)

Not all laptops have a BIOS configuration that allows you to choose the GPU (ASUS UL series for instance). On mine, I had to change the SATA operation mode to have the second GPU work, but this in turn meant a severe performance degradation on my SSD. Without that (deficient) improvisation, I would not have been able to use the second GPU at all!

Besides, logging out of your desktop and then logging in again is surely better than what you suggest?

Yes, let's trivialize reality the other way around and shift the blame onto the people instead, who obviously elected the wrong representatives... No need to burden the mind with complicated problems like the electoral process, lobbying activities, campaign contributions, concentration of media ownership, etc etc.

Just wanted to point out this little tibit regarding the Pledge of Allegiance:

The Pledge is predominantly sworn by children in public schools in response to state laws requiring the Pledge to be offered.

That is, teaching loyalty to the state at an early age is not just typical of totalitarian states, for better or for worse. Not to belittle your criticism of the Sandinista regime, of course.

I think it is an alternative to string theory.

From http://www.physicsforums.com/showthread.php?t=313565 :

Yes, but it is a lousy implementation of the WIPO Copyright Treaty. There were other competing legislation, and considering that U.S. law already complied with the entire treaty with the exception of one provision, I think it is fairly safe to say the DMCA goes far beyond being a mere implementation. The DMCA law dramatically expanded the scope of copyright law, conflicting with the first sale doctrine by granting copyright owners the power to dictate audience behavior, and going ridiculously far beyond copyright protection by giving owners the power to control access to intellectual property, whether a violation exists or not. You can read more about it in Taking A Bite Out Of Circumvention: Analyzing 17 U.S.C. Â 1201 As A Criminal Law by Jason M. Schultz. There is also a nice summary taken from a paper by Pamela Samuelson, Why the Anti-Circumvention Regulations Need to be Revised.

Not really since huge amounts of offensive content is readily available through Safari. I believe the true rationale for Apple's censorship policy is that it is easier to justify when claimed to protect the children, rather than just eliminating the competition or whatever threatens their bottom line.

Problem: classified information leaks to general public.
Solution: regulate the general public.

So if you loose track of your private information, just start a couple of those botnets to monitor the internets... never fails...

But what is the difference in weight between the thruster versus parachute landing systems?

Sure, the added complexity may not improve the odds, but ignoring the inherent risk new technology entails, how much of an impact on safety are we really talking about here? It would seem that this is the way forward considering how NASA has also been contemplating a similar approach with the Delta Clipper for quite some time.

It makes no sense to spin off OpenOffice before knowing what Oracle does to it. What I think most of us really care about is some reinvigoration in the OpenOffice project, which this change may help bring about.

If someone fired 6,000 rockets at me, I would be pissed of course. But I wouldn't retaliate through collective punishment, denying food and medicine to innocent civilians, evicting them out of their home and taking their land to build "settlements" to my compatriots, especially knowing that my country was created from territory unwillingly provided by the very same people. I think "out of proportion" doesn't mean what you think it means...

Then convolute further and use a mouse instead of a cat...

The anti-circumvention provisions in the DMCA is based on the assumption that DRM works. It is much harder to defeat the DMCA if you ignore the fallacy of DRM because, then, legislators will keep believing it helps a large part of the US economy (that is, the media industry).

The DMCA states that you are not allowed to circumvent a mechanism that protects a copyrighted work even if circumvention is your only means of exercising numerous rights granted by law. Basically, it is in direct conflict with far older and established laws, and so you end up in court trying to resolve this contradiction, with one side having little money to pay for a lawyer while the other finances political campaigns to see their favorite laws enacted.