Hmm, I get "murdered". I blame you! :)

I'm making that number up, obviously

Ah, the RIAA approach to arguments.

Well, except for the part about admitting it. And maybe being somewhat close to reality. And not bribing politicians to believe my number. And...

He'd rather get zero dollars from them than $5000, because he deems the deal to be "unfair". Um, OK. I'd take the "free" $5000, myself.

If it's a free $5000, sure, it's a no-brainer. The problem comes when your "free" $5000 displaces $15000 (I'm making that number up, obviously) that you might have earned from another more lucrative streaming operation if Spotify hadn't stomped all over the market.

If it comea down to a choice between $5000 and $0, well, that's a bit harder to call...

Ok, you're cynical and I'm naive.

I'm not a US citizen. I have no voting rights to choose the US President. I have no desire to be spied on by the intelligence agencies of a foreign country whose leadership does not answer to me. And yes, I think all of the world which doesn't live in the USA would be better off without the USA spying on us.

I think you'll find there are a few more people living outside the USA than inside it, and I think you'll find that most of them share my view.

They can't put any conditions upon when they'll accept a notice; refusing a notice merely means they lose their liability protection.

But yeah, they could indirectly do it, with other punative measures against recurring abusers. If, say, notices regarding "Boardwalk Empire" were to exceed 50% bogus threshold (i.e. they are wasting Google's time, costing Google money) then Google could just remove HBO's own pages from searches too. Then they could charge in proportion to HBO's abuse, to restore the HBO links. What's really cute about this idea, is that censorship mechanisms already exist at Google, thanks to the same damn industry.

I love the bonding idea too (if anyone should be posting bonds with DMCA notices, it's HBO!), but that's something Congress would have to do.

I just came back from a trip to the Boundary Waters up in Minneosta and let me tell you, if you are one of the unfortunate 20%, be prepared with 40% DEET spray, a head net, and long-sleeve shirts and pants. Otherwise you're miserable up there.

I grew up in northern Ontario. I'm not sure we have any of the 20% left in the gene pool anymore. About the only good thing I can say about the mosquitos are that they don't carry the diseases they have in the tropics.

I always thought of inventing a mosquito trap using some sort of machine.

It's been done.

They do work pretty well, covering approx a 1/2 acre area without too much trouble.

Blow up environmental protest ships.

How many people actually make calls nowadays anyway?

For personal use, I'd wager not too many.

I'm texting and/or using data most of the time when I've got my phone out.

I don't have a landline, and my personal cell gets maybe 10-15 minutes per month of calls.

My work phone, on the other hand, probably racks up a few hours a month. I telecommute a couple days a week, and while I use data for most communications I still have conference calls and other discussions. Eventually that stuff might go to VoIP or something, but we're not there yet.

And yes, I use a headset most of the time. My work cell is, ironically, a bit too small to hold comfortably for the length of a call.

Regardless of whether you think what Snowden did (and continues to do) is good or bad, he is a traitor to the country.

If you think what he did was bad, then he's a traitor to his country. If you think what he did was good, then he's a traitor to his government and a hero to his country. I think a lot of peoples' opinions on the good/bad question are going to correspond with their opinion about whether or not the country and the government are on the same side.

It does however go on to suggest that some high-intensity flickering may be detectable (by cones only and not by rods) at up to 60Hz, which is somewhat closer to OP's figure.

But arguably he can't be worse than the slate of directors who got them to where they are.

True, unless he convinces them to pull an Elop.

I've seen a dog watch TV, though she had a pretty short attention span. The best part is what she was watching and what was happening; it was perfect. It was a nature show about wolves, and there was a pack and an "outsider" wolf. I shit you not: my dog started growling at the outsider! Something about its posture, I guess.

That meme pretty much bit the dust with the advent of decent bluetooth (or even wired) headsets, or integrated vehicle sets.

If a device is too big to hold comfortably to the ear, you're pretty much an idiot (or, to be redundant, a hipster) to stand there holding it that way if there's a better solution.

At this point, the only significant difference between "tablet" and "phone" should come down to pocketability and how well you can hold it.

Unless you count the invention of algebra or codifying the algorithm, or any of the other great advancements in mathematics that came out of the Islamic Golden Age, of course....