Just to clear up some confusion of what I meant, it's not the form factor on it's own that's interesting, it's the software stack the comes with it. It doesn't matter if it's a 17" Laptop or that it's a an 18" Tablet form factor, the fact is giving access to Android OS (with full hardware support, eg: sensors) on this large a screen opens up possibilities where end users are capable of managing their own device (including the installation of 3rd party apps) on a screen size (with the right DPI) that they can actually see with a low risk of malware infection (especially malware that can bring down the entire system or cripple core functionality).

Being that it is such a large form factor, that just begs Samsung to bring Keyboard/Mouse/Multitasking support to the tablet, and that will bring Android as a valid competitor to the Windows PC space at least for users with simple needs (web/e-mail/Youtube/Skype/home user apps/etc.) and don't have much IT knowledge.

Finally something appropriate for the older crowd with poor vision. Add Keyboard & Mouse support and a stand and you are giving a PC a run for it's money when it comes to basic computer tasks for a home user, who have found tablets to be too small in the past.

Not just a lot of RAM, it MUST be ECC RAM for ZFS. Without ECC, even a single flipped bit can cause ZFS to corrupt the entire file system.

Australia has Company Taxes AND GST(VAT/sales)

I would support this if the government:

1. Pursued these companies for company tax, not just make them pass on GST from our pockets.
2. More funding to the ACCC to make these companies actually stick to Australian Consumer Laws (i.e. Sony PSN & Steam)
3. Do something about the price disparity to overseas that can not be reasonably be explained by the tax, shipping, costs to do business in Australia, etc.

But knowing this government, it will just be another hairbrain implementation that hurts anyone who is not a middle/upper-class baby-boomer.

Yes, exactly right

I like the concept of paying for content to support my usage instead of going through annoying ads, but I don't use Youtube all that often, usually only because someone else has given me a link to something in particular. Those 30 second ads which sometimes lets you skip after 5 seconds and sometimes don't let you skip at all are really annoying. I hope that they give a low-tier option. For example $1 per year which is good for ad-free (or no forced ads) up to 500 videos.

The most important thing is that I hope that the subscription options are compelling enough that someone would WANT to use it over the use of an Adblocker without any Adblocking counter-measures put in place.

If it is successful (for consumers) it would be great if an ad-free pass could be extended across any other websites too that participate, not just Youtube.

I use Adblock because the quality of advertising is too invasive, not because I don't to deprive websites of revenue.

It doesn't matter how big you engineer for, sooner or later something big enough will come along and topple everything. Containing high water levels in nature has been tried many times before and they always fail sooner or later.

This is dumb engineering.

When you activate by phone the IVR states:

If you have a look at the pictures, you can see that it has more than a similarity to the iPad mini than just "rounded corners". It basically looks identical except for the Apple Logo and home button.

Now with this piece of news, it does seem like Foxconn have ripped off the iPad mini design (given their detailed knowledge of the manufacturing process) and are using the "Nokia" (Microsoft) brand to sell it, given that Microsoft have a cross-licensing deal with Apple that lets Microsoft and Apple rip each other off as much as they like.

It seems that Apple can't do a thing about it. They can't even get rid of Samsung components in their devices, how would they ever get away from Foxconn.

And then I realised we are nowhere near April 1. Maybe '10' is going back to year designations... Hang on that was 4 years ago. I can't help but to think that when they pull things like this (eg: 'ME') it is inevitably going to end in disaster, except this time they some actual competition from Google and Apple in the mobile space (which is on the verge of taking over the desktop)

On both Firefox and Chrome, the efforts to require permission to install an extension can be bypassed if the installer has local access to manually tell the config files that it has been 'approved' even when it has not, and this is quite prevalent.

Of course it's not going to affect technical folk who avoid installation of spyware to begin with, but this is a sensible security step for the masses.

Chrome/Chromium doesn't have extensions on Android so that platform is not applicable to this move.
Chromebook laptops can be unlocked and replaced with Chromium builds.

Chromium is open source so if you don't like it, fork you own copy and get whatever useless toolbars that install without permission that you want.