I have actually considered the truecrypt container backup but I was unclear that Backblaze supported incremental backups. I was under the impression that each time a file is backed up the entire file is re-uploaded. Is a diff process used instead rather than re-uploading 1Gb every time a text file within the truecrypt container is changed? How do you handle the issue that many truecrypt volumes do not update their access and modified timestamps on files to be aware that changes have been made?

Thanks for all the responses to this post. While your drive observations are perhaps unique to your setup they still have information to offer the rest of us.

The hell? People change jobs for a million reasons, few of which have anything to do with "back" and whatever macho/nationalistic fantasy you've got going on there.

- People at the beginning of their careers sometimes improve their skills more rapidly than their employers can accommodate. eg, the guy who starts out doing desktop support and grows into a sysadminning role, at a company that's already overstaffed on sysadmins.

- Companies downsize or go out of business. Any time you join a startup it is a crapshoot (mostly based upon factors outside your control) whether it will still be around next year. Does that mean that no one should ever join new companies?

- Many, many people simply cannot afford to live anywhere near their offices.

- Changes in medical conditions may alter the type and amount of work that you're capable of.

- Changes in your or your family's medical or educational situation may alter the amount or reliability of money necessary. eg, moving to a less fulfilling job at a big corporation with solid medical benefits.

And, frankly, change and drive and curiosity are good things. I would much rather hire someone who has displayed the ability to excel in ten different environments than someone who has sat still at one company for a decade.

Yes, clearly the only reasonable solution is for everyone to move (probably to a vastly different neighborhood with completely different safety and cost) every time they change jobs. Certainly there's nothing in the world wiser than applying for a new mortgage every time you have just started a new job.

Also, couples or people living together are only allowed to work within four blocks of one another.

I don't know what a "Humble Bundle" is; again, I suspect it's something that features far more prominently in some small specialized market than in the general world. I would suggest that your deep involvement with this niche may be impairing your perspective.

Just glancing at the small games market, 90k sales certainly seems unexceptional. The top few dozen games sold through itunes seem to each have 10k-30k _reviews_, which almost certainly implies many more than 90k sales.

And given that those all, obviously, run without Flash, it's hard to see this as supporting the case that Flash does something unique or important.

>>> ...online multimedia platform.
>> Can you tell us what that is?
> Like he said, it doesn't have a viable feature-comparable alternative.

That... doesn't answer the question. If your argument is that Flash is so awesome because it's the best "online multimedia platform", then you're going to have to back that up to what the fuck an "online multimedia platform" is and why I would want one.

Because yes, like many others in this conversation, I have only seen Flash used for things that I quite strongly did not want happening in any browser of mine. So if the only consequence of Flash's death is that those things couldn't happen anymore that sounds to me like a huge improvement.

It backfires a bit when your argument in favor of Flash being at the heart of a vast and vital industry is citing a company no one has ever heard of and three games that no one has ever heard of.

It sounds as if you live in some tiny little niche universe in which "multimedia platform" is a thing. But you should be aware that for nearly everyone else out there, those words are not even meaningful, much less describe anything important or desired.

> Here's how it works: faced with low price competition, if you immediately drop your price to defend your market share

This is how it works for, say, the Dells of the world: the companies who just repackage others' technologies rather than creating anything, and thus have control only over market traits like price.

But you're forgetting the other lever available to companies that actually create new things, which is to compete on quality and innovation. This has always been Apple's chosen tactic, and it has served them incredibly well, making them the most stable and successful technology company over the last 35ish years.

> Until we become more enlightened here on Earth and make some progress in the nature of the human heart, we will only bring those problems with us.

Really, sorting out the nature of the human heart will get rid of asteroids? I had no idea.

Man, dinosaurs must have been assholes.