Weirdly, that seems to be one reason the new pope is unpopular with the evangelical right: the left like him.

Unless companies who want their corporate information to remain secret adopt it first and force some progress.

And it runs Windows?

Good grief, people! Healthcare!

"Glass, call the RT." "This is the RT. Can I help you?" "Can you have a look at this man's breathing? We're not sure what's going on..."

I've actually contacted Bloomberg to ask about this, and they're not even open-sourcing anything. They're announcing their intention to form a committee to create open standards based on their tech. This is great because it will help fill gaps that AMQP and others are trying to fill, but I'm not sure it deserves an announcement until, you know, there's actually something to look at.

And how do I, Random J Hacker, figure out that I'm not infringing an existing patent?

For the same reason that being able to sue bloggers, but not newspapers, for their sources results in a chilling effect on free speech. I was willing to contribute to the advancement of software as an independent developer-- until I realized that I could not afford a lawyer or patent searches. Even if I could, Google, with its army of lawyers, could not stay out of court. If they get sued, they have patents and money. They can duke it out. If I get sued, that's the end for me.

So the grandparent quote is right-- only those with deep pockets can afford to play this innovation game safely. Anyone else is playing fast and loose with their earnings, waiting for you, the patent lawyer, to come take them, with the force of law and an inscrutable patent system on your side. I will not play that game. I am the innovation you lost.

I had a history professor that wanted a run-on fact dump for an essay. I was nearly failing his class until I understood that. Teachers' requirements (and by extension, how they teach writing) aren't necessarily consistent.

I think the whole question is a category error. Science and religion need not conflict at all-- you can imagine a world where a god runs physics and we detect him with our telescopes. You can also imagine a religion devoted to science.

The problem is that science conflicts with specific religions-- say, like almost all forms of Judaism and Christianity, which require that there was once a flood covering the entire planet.

The view of the original authors, who should be able to lay claim to special revelation, was that the Earth was fixed with a dome over it: http://faculty.gordon.edu/hu/bi/Ted_Hildebrandt/OTeSources/01-Genesis/Text/Articles-Books/Seely-Firmament-WTJ.pdf

That Catholics in later centuries, with the advantage of being informed by science, didn't believe this is uninteresting. It is interesting that their view does not match the views of those who supposedly had direct access to the source.

I'm not at all surprised that you are unaware of and hostile to these religious claims you claim were not made. The truth, even if you don't like it, is that they are still being made. Or do you think that a religious idea has to be universal before it can be considered stupid?

Except that if the network isn't connected to the Internet in any way, and you're relying on a third party as your vector, you have no way of getting information back about their systems or altering your attack after delivery. You have one shot to get the attack right.

Removing the Internet vector doesn't eliminate the possibility of attack, but it sure cuts down on chances for success. I'll take that.

What is this stupid phrasing "Steve Austin, anyone?" about? Why do people use it? You can just hear the writer's pleading voice going "Eh? Eh? Aren't I clever?" as if you couldn't catch his meaning unless he elbowed you in the ribs a few more times.

Quite likely, in a region subject to permafrost.

Episode 5 was directed by Irvin Kershner. George didn't direct Episode 6. So yes, you can lay the success of EP5 directly at Kershner's feet.

This is exactly how modern movies are funded. No executive can predict the success of a movie. But if the studio invests in enough movies, there's almost a guaranteed return.