Hmm, here in the U.S. where I am utility workers are not government employees. The very situation you described happened and the individual was arrested, arraigned and prosecuted.

As popular as it is to bash Palin, this isn't about Slashdots users estimate of her acumen, but about David Kernell breaking the law. Seems pretty cut and dry to me.

I'd like to look at it from another perspective. I assume an IT department in an Hospital your dealing with general desktop apps as well as Patient data for insurance claims and employee data of some description. The thought that confidential patient data might be replicated on someones 'personal' machine quite frankly chills me. If I was Emperor if the IT department, I'd ban and make a sack-able offense plugging your personal machine into the hospital network. In my mind, I'd forgo any ability of employees to check their email from home. In fact I'd actively discourage it unless you were currently on-call for a specific reason and that on-call person would be issued work equipment for the task. If patient data was leaked and the media got hold of the story any argument for using personal machines and not locking down the network and securing the machines connected to it would be fuel for that media frenzy.

Not so much, I imagine. Those are a lot more effective with small spills already on the surface... this time, it's moving up from below, where it can cover a wider area as it rises. Skimmers and floats can help, but they're not a prominent solution for something this large. It's like putting a band-aid on a severed artery.

What ever happened to those chains of floats used to encircle a spill and contain it? True, it is huge now but what about earlier when it could have been manageable?