Wait... Mandrake got a sex change!? When did that happen, and why don't I care?

The first thing that comes to my mind when I remember my trip to the UK is not the Buckingham Palace, the British Museum or the red buses.
Its those freaking huge plugs together with their freaking huge power racks.
Really, what where they thinking?

I've never had any problems with the US style plugs, after seeing the european, british and japanese plugs (which are like the US but with a small aberration), I don't know why people complain so much.

What's a homepage? My browser just boots with whatever was on it when I shut it down.

30% this time is less than 30% the last time they showed a speed increase.

Start off with 100%, 30% faster gives you 70% of the original time. Take off another 30% and now you're doing it at 49% of the original time. Now remember, we're on the 5th iteration of XX% faster, since the original chrome was XX% faster than (whatever they were compare it to).

Its not likely most people will notice a 30% increase on most pages, especially Googles own pages.

When you're talking about taking 30% off of something that already loaded in 1 or 2 seconds, no one notices, you get more delay from your overloaded cable modem than from the browser.

They attempted to bring grounded plugs into wide-spread use, but it is difficult to totally eradicate the standard two-prong (polarized or non-polarized) plugs which were already in use in the US. This is the main source of the mixing that goes on, and it is largely unavoidable.

A well-built three-prong grounded plug will not fall out of the socket if the outlet is of similar quality. Furthermore, loose plugs can be easily tightened up by bending the prongs inward slightly so that they hold the plug into the socket more tightly.

...or tequila

You are confusing the korean war with WWII...also, you're confusing real life with a MASH episode.

"So the placebo can work for large amounts of acute pain. "
No it can't.

"And as with hypnosis - whether or not it's a related phenomenon - there's great variability in the population as to whether it has much effect."
Yes, those who want to act like a chicken, and those who don't.

> the more companies that make money by abusing our privacy, the more demand
> there is for privacy tools.

Oh you mean like the business model of the anti-virus industry? :-)

Thanksgiving is another fine example of a holiday only really celibrated in the US & Canada.

Now I understand that some things are not relevant for the entire world, but still big enough to be considered. Christmas comes to mind.

is the source of all evil in the world

all greed is is a desire to accumulate to support yourself. sometimes more than you need, but how do you draw the line? often it is the case that one mans reach for more winds up filling the bounty of those who can't or won't reach at all. societal systems that lock people's reach down wind up impoverishing all, not equating everyone at a high equal rate. there is always some natural inequality of accumulation due to merit and ability (and also via nepotism, inheritance, other vile ways) but this society with an inequality of riches is still richer than a society where everyone is artificially locked down to how much they are able to acquire. in other words, you need to accept some amount of inequality because any attempt to equalize people's wants and needs just deflates everyone's income overall

if you have a system which doesn't reward greed, people starve, literally. flesh is flesh: its sustenance is an act of transgression. you can't make a valid moral system that ignores the life-affirming value of greed

There is no war. We decided together that this was the right step to take right now to protect our mutual users, based on our understanding of the problem and outcomes.

This really is the first step. Government funding has fallen far short, we need space tourism to get us back on track. Burt Rutan gave a good ted talk on it a few years back.

The top of course. Wouldn't it be so much easier to build the entire building, then drop it from a helicopter onto the ground?