They're talking about all versions, not just 4e. All the nifty 3.5, 3.0, 2e, and earlier material that's now out-of-print is gone and no longer accessible. If you had a group still playing 2e, and a new guy joined who didn't know the rules, up until this boneheaded move by WotC he could still go to rpgnow.com and instantly buy the core rules, legally, and be able to read up on them. And WotC would get a large chunk of that sale as essentially free money, because it's the distributor that bears all the costs associated with hosting the file.

Now, the only legal recourse is to buy a used copy somewhere. And that doesn't profit WotC anyway.

Yeah, the Character Builder update thing sucks. And, as far as I've been able to tell, there's no easy way to back up the software. I've resorted to building a VM just for it, and archiving the 2gb disk image as a backup. I'm going to be wiping my computer clean again pretty soon, and running the VM's going to be the way I have to use the CB after that.

I'm glad that WotC don't own the trademarks to chess or monopoly or go or some other classic game.

Actually Hasbro owns the trademarks to both D&D and Monopoly.

That's why I keep my online handle disassociated from my real name. I even have two separate email accounts. One I give to friends who know I'm a sick fuck, and one I give to employers who know I'm a good reliable person.

Googling my real name doesn't turn up much that's actually associated with me. Last I checked out of all the hits only two were me; one was a tech troubleshooting site and the other a source code archive.

Googling my main handle turns up all the weird porn I'm into. I really really don't want to have any public link for the two.

I also put most really personal things in a private setting on my blog, so only authorized people can view it. I'm sure it could get out eventually, like an authorized person getting a virus that transmits their browser cache or something, but it's Good Enough for me.

Totally. I even do this with service packs, rather than risking problems, since lately MS has been adding new functionality to service packs instead of just bugfixing.

On Mondays, I never go to work
On Tuesdays, I stay at home
On Wednesdays, I never feel inclined
Work is the last thing on my mind
On Thursdays, it's a holiday!
And Fridays I detest
Oh it's much too late on a Saturday
And Sunday's the day of rest

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=m3Kgj6EiZtw

I had one for my GBA SP that worked on the original 'heavy' DS. The one end looked like a normal USB A-type connector, and the other end just plugged into the DS. It did have a slightly larger plug than my charger, which leads me to believe there's probably a resistor or fuse in there too, and not just wired straight in.

A quick bit of googling turns up these:
For the DS lite: http://www.thegametrain.com/ds-lite-usb-power-charge-cable-p-192.html
For the GBA SP / DS original: http://www.thegametrain.com/gba-sp-usb-power-charger-p-351.html

Hop on Google some more, there's a bunch out there. The magic keywords seem to be 'ds usb power'.

Oh, definitely, if you're doing a presentation-type thing, where picture size and placement is important, by all means use a word processor, or even a PowerPoint-like thing if you know the receiving party can view it. Even a PDF would be good.

A quick paste and save of a lolcat is another matter entirely.

Same here. I recently had a potential employer send me an *important* document in the new Word 2007 docx format. I happened to have an older copy of Word 2003 that was unable to open it. I had to search for and install an addon that allowed older copies of Office (back to 2000) read the new format, maybe write it, I'm not sure. I know OpenOffice 2.4 couldn't open it, though I see they're out with version 3 now, and hadn't tried it. I finally manage to open the document, and what was inside?

Plain text. It had a title at the top that was underlined and centered, and the whole thing was in MS Comic Sans, but that's still plain text. There was no reason not to save it as an .rtf file, an older .doc file, or even just copy and paste into an email. But Word was used because it was there.

Also, I've seen lots of office workers exchange pictures via pasting them in Word and emailing the doc files to each other, instead of learning that pictures can also be saved as files.

Hey, it's not too far off from plausible. Check out the Microsoft Big Ass Table(tm)

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CZrr7AZ9nCY

And I play a lot of new games at low settings on a 5-year-old $700 system. Sure, I can't play Oblivion, or BioShock, but I'm keeping up with all of TellTale's stuff.

If you're going to use a touchpad, does it matter where you put it?

Before touchscreens, we didn't have the 'fingers obscuring the screen' input problem at all.

I have Road Runner by itself too, in the Columbus, OH area. I pay just $40 a month for it. No extra fees, not even taxes, the bill is exactly $40.00.

There is one hidden, non-monetary cost though: every month, like clockwork, to let me know that I could be saving money if I got their TV and phone service too. I tell them I'm not interested two or three times, and they seem to get the picture, until next month, when they call again.

This.

My high school, when I first got there, had an Apple //e in certain classrooms. They were never used for anything educational at all, unless you count some kids looking up "dysentery" after they died from it a hundred times over in Oregon Trail.

Then, for some reason, we got a Computer Lab room. One dozen shiny new 486 computers. No software, not even the latest version of Oregon Trail. No direction whatsoever with them. The most the students did was play Solitaire and Minesweeper. Some used Write (the predecessor to WordPad) to type up things, but hardly ever school-related.

Meanwhile the art teacher bought her own paper and pencils for the students to use because there wasn't enough budget.