I don't think this is aimed at people like Natalie Portman so much. Age discrimination is a real problem. This is aimed to help out people that don't have her stature and her resources.

No matter what I do, even if I DIY I end up with like 10 years payoff. If it was 5 years I;d do it tomorrow!

How about clay tile roofs? That's what I have, and it looks nice but I couldn't figure if it was going to help in a fire or not.

Apple and Facebook were served with warrants that required them to turn over the information. They did not. This isn't 'help', its just following the law.

I've never owed a new car, I don't think its a very good value. Cars lose like half their value in the first few years, and the insurance kills you (and road taxes, some places charge road fees based on how old the car is.).

Hi Larry,

I'm a profession Perl5 programmer who is very worried about the future of my language. I remember when you kicked off Perl6 in the very late 1990s the talk was that it would replace Perl5. Clearly that never happened. If you could redo the project what might you do differently?

I bought my first new TV in like 20 years last Christmas and since I was splurging I wanted a great screen. I decided on a Samsug Plasma screen that was very highly rated. However to get that screen I had to buy the crappy smart TV features. If I could have bought the same screen as s dumb TV I would have.

In generally the TV companies bundle all their highest end screens with crappy 'smart' features.

"...than your living room TV."

Which part is that, the part where I pay $20 for smelly nacho's or the part where I get to enjoy my movie in crappy seats surrounded by rude louts?

I can't figure there is a single part of the movie theatre experience that I miss at all.

I would have thought this would be the case years ago, give the price disparity.

just not with my money. We could end crime by embedding a chip into everyone so we could track everyone's movements and know exactly were everyone is at every second. I don't see anyone jumping at that idea.

...

This is one of those things that sounds like it could be tricky to actually get right. Still they could just do what that secret service does when choose travel options for the President; you flip a coin with one agent calling it in air and the other doing the flipping. Seems reasonable free from exploits.

FWIW I don't think this about cryptographically secure random and more about a system that by design can't be hacked and such that you'd need to bribe an entire team to get through the line you want.

This A.I. was designed to learn from the people it spoke with. As a result she came to quickly reflect the ID of those with nothing better to do than to tweet with a computer program.

I like my larger iPhone since with my eyes aging a bit I like the big screen. I work from home so the mobility isn't an issue so much. On the bonus side my 6plus has great battery life IMHO. However I know a lot of people wanted a 4 inch phone and was sad that Apple stopped making one. Those people are going to be happy if the phone is any good. If you use the phone mostly as a phone and have a tablet or other mobile device for extended web browsing, mapping, etc then a 4 inch phone might be great for you. I am going to guess this phone is not going to be the 'cheap apple phone'. I think its going to be a premium phone but with a smaller screen. There will be some cost reduction because of the smaller screen and smaller batter but this is not going to be a phone to compete with $300 android phones.

I am a little excited to see what the new iPad is going to be like. my wife and I have older minis, which we like because of the weight, but I find the screen is a bit small for reading unless I am holding it at 'book reading distance.' I'd like a device I could put on the kitchen table with coffee and read the news without needing to pick it up. My eyes find that hard to do with the mini. The 10 inch model has been getting lighter recently, so if there's a model light enough for me to comfortable hold when I am reading in bed I might opt for that over a new mini. My guess is this device might not be lighter however. :(

"But it's not easy to see why potential poets and philosophers face a lofty mathematics bar. "

I was a Philosophy major in college and I did Calculus... I do agree that I hardly use more than basic algebra. Perhaps a real life math class and statistics are more useful. I find doing stuff like figuring out a mortgage and 'how long will it take me to pay off my credit card' is pretty useful.