I expected to wake up to this some day, but I did not expect to wake up to it TODAY. This is very sad news but I can say boldly that Patrick Stewart led a full and meaningful life and had a profound positive impact on the world around him.

Good night, Sir Stewart.

No thanks on the light-up Apple logo for me. I think it started with the Powerbook G3 (I had one, it was a great computer) and it was sort of obnoxious even then. I'm not paid to be a light-up billboard everywhere I go.

No thanks on the laptop touchscreen, either. I understand it on something like a Surface tablet -- almost -- but most of the time I used my Surface with a keyboard, like a regular laptop, and never touched the screen. I think ramming touchscreens down everybody's throats was just a gimmick Microsoft came up with, both to A.) convince everybody that Windows 8 worked equally well on laptops and tablets (it sure did); and B.) once again, everybody needed to go out and buy a new laptop, even though their current one worked and served their needs just fine.

Many of your victims won't be able to say anything even if the files aren't decrypted -- this case is a good example, since the company in question couldn't admit publicly that they were paying ransoms.

A little searching shows that scams (beyond the base "pay to decrypt") are very common. You're dealing with criminals. If you pay a ransom, they now know that you have money that you're willing to pay, and they're going to do whatever they can to get more of it.

We're running a business here. We need real software, not toys created as a fun weekend experiment with a chatbot or burning money to run an agent and get 50% (or more likely 5%) of the way there.

How long before we start deploying remotely piloted and full autonomous drones to fly escort missions for cargo runs? There have been numerous instances of cargo theft from trailers, or hijacked full loads when drivers were doing their mandated federal rest stop. I would assume things would eventually escalate to wifi and anti-drone jamming for higher value loads, but those are extremely visible attacks (the signals equivalent of taking bolt cutters to your power line). At that point, you'd have actual armed security (possibly being provided by insurers) guarding high-value convoys against hijackers...

https://www.transportation.gov...

You'd have to either discipline or expel cheaters. You can't discipline cheaters because then their mommy and daddy will stop giving money to the endowment. You can't expel cheaters because the school will lose the tuition revenue on top of that.

There is no financial justification whatsoever for solving the cheating problem.

This anti-AI bullshit has got to stop. If an AI finds a real bug in your program, sing hallelujah and move on with life. Computers will always be able to execute algorithms faster than humans, and with greater depth and accuracy. That's the whole point of their existence - to do stuff that is too complex for humans to do, and to do it quickly.

Bolsonaro: "We cheated fair and square and didn't win, so we're going to sue."

It's the same playbook Trump is going to use to try to overturn the midterm results because "we couldn't possibly have lost because we rigged the election with gerrymandered election maps!"

You'll see. Just wait.