A little known counter-intuitive fact about our earth is that "sea level" is not the same everywhere. We didn't find that out until after years of making maps that assumed sea level was constant all over the earth.

Ham Radio has done this since the early 90's. It's only 300-1200 baud though. Yes, also with satellites.

Where I see the difference is that 30 years ago, children were being taught to program computers in school. Now days, they are being used essentially as a media delivery system. Schools use computers to keep the students interested in the lesson by videos and games. Students are encouraged to be consumers of computer technology, not the creators of it.

Yeah, absolutely.

So she didn't get a blood test or breath test back at the station? I mean, a field sobriety test is just that, a FIELD test. You can ask for another alternative test, which is more accurate. In fact a conviction pretty much requires it. So what gives?

the CRU is taking blowtorches to all the glacial ice in Greenland and the polar caps to make their case, too!

The law allows these kinds of searches to protect the officers making the arrest from hidden/concealed weapons carried by the suspect. This includes being permitted to search within an the arms length in the U.S. because they are accessableby the suspect. Seems reasonable to me. You might argue about the admissibility of evidence for *another* crime if it is found, but expecting EVERY police office to wake up a judge for EVERY arrest they perform for a warrant of this type is an example of a "bad law." Police have a right to protect themselves, especially since they deal with violent offenders ALL THE TIME.

I was going to make a joke like "You mean other than Apple?" but that's too easy.

BSD's desktop users fill the same nitch as Slackware. Advanced users that want to do it themselves. That said, most Linux distro's were put together because, as we all know, Linux is a kernel, and not a complete OS. BSD's, are a more complete distro, and the ports system alleviates the need for a lot of stuff that Linux distros take care of (like a package manager.) Still, they both are "worth it" to develop for for their developers and users, and that's a good thing.