The only two options are "within 1000 years" and "never" if you want to maximize your chance of being correct, because "within 1000 years" includes all the other timed options.

That's a good point, I think. I would not be at all surprised if a lot of the grievances mentioned in the article were not race-related at all, or not intended to insult someone because of their race, but they were interpreted as such. I think it's very easy to read a racist motivation or between-the-lines meaning into relatively innocuous statements or events, especially when you are conditioned into believing everyone around you is racist. For example, "Still another said managers spoke down to her and her Black [sic] colleagues, adding that they were passed over for promotions in favor of less experienced white employees." That could have been something like a manager saying, "We need to talk. You are not performing as well in tasks and on reviews as some of your coworkers [who happen to be white], and I am worried because they are getting promoted ahead of you despite your experience. I want you to succeed and show others you have what it takes--because I know you do." If you are looking to be offended you can probably find it in any slight or negative comment.

Personally I have never met anyone in tech who I would describe as racist or bigoted. Maybe I'm sheltered?

Yeah for sure. But do you really take the anecdotes in the article at face value? I don't.

Well, close. I wouldn't technically call it a dictatorship because the power is spread out around various people and groups, including the Standing Committee, former members of the Standing Committee and the military. But you're on the right track. 1) China is communist only in name. 2) Even if they were fully communist, that's an economic system, not a political one per se. The word that you and the grandparent poster is looking for is 'authoritarian.' BTW I lived in China for three and a half years and IMO they are getting the government they deserve. Freedom, truth, and Classical Liberal ideals are not high on their list of values.

We do, my friend. They're called tablets and e-readers. But while I certainly am no luddite, I have to admit that reading words on a glowing screen is no substitute for the experience of reading from printed book. There's something about reading a book on a tablet I find unsatisfying.

"The Chinese are notoriously obvious liars when it comes to their government statements." It's not just the government, friend.

It's not racist to point out that a culture has flaws. What I think a lot of Westerners don't understand about China is that it's not just like this government was created in a vacuum; the corruption, lying, cheating and general lack of ethical and moral scruples are facets of modern Chinese culture that also happen to manifest themselves in their government.

Roleplay-enforced MUDs might be right up your alley.

For a fairly entertaining examination of this idea, someone might want to check out out Neal Stephenson's Baroque Cycle books. I've only gotten through the first (Quicksilver) but it takes place during Newton's lifetime and Newton himself is one of the more major characters, along with Leibnitz and other less famous "natural philosophers."

Yes, Mr. Kotick is one of the most hated people in the industry for good reason. Check out this extremely detailed and disturbing post on Teamliquid.net about how little he cares for his developers and the games produced by the studios under Activision.

Personally, I blame him for the deluge of bad decisions coming out of Blizzard regarding Starcraft II, including:
-No LAN play
-No cross-regional play
-Fees for tournaments and a more centralized, locked-down system in Battle.net 2.0

Most or all of these features were available in the Starcraft, which was released in 1998! I expect some or all of the features that the community is clamoring for will be introduced eventually--for a subscription fee. Because that's all Kotick sees in the Starcraft community: a bunch of passive cows who are just begging to be milked of all their worth.

And the worst part is, I pre-ordered Starcraft II anyway. Sigh.

Wow, I see you're already getting used to acting like an American. You'll be ready in no time! :) --note to sensitive moderators: the smiling emoticon means it is a joke.

Since when does an ellipsis denote sarcasm or irony? It just seemed like you were trailing off.

South Korea doesn't even have nukes. That's North Korea. And even if they did have nukes, their "arch-enemy" is right across the border.

MAYBE, but in your country you walk a block to the local DVD store and choose from a selection of thousands of pirated DVDs, each selling for the equivalent of 1.25 USD per disc? That's what it's like living in any city in China. It's probably impossible to buy a NON-pirated DVD in China (I for one have never seen one!). Technically these shops are breaking the law, but the relevant laws are not enforced.

Another example of the higher level of piracy is Baidu's music search. Baidu is the Chinese equivalent of Google, and using mp3.baidu.com you can find pirated mp3s of pretty much every song you'd want to hear. They block some of the files if you are accessing it from a foreign IP address, though. Check this search I just did (from inside China). Can you imagine if Google had a site like this? It would be sued into oblivion (although blogsearch.google.com can get pretty close!)

Even on TV, pirating is rampant. Talk shows and reality shows often take their background music the soundtracks of popular films like the Lord of the Rings or Star Wars, and something tells me they aren't coughing up royalty checks for that.

I figured as much, and I still use Chrome for light browsing, but as I said, my computer is aging and it does have to swap to disk frequently. :-/

I actually have been using it up to and through the latest version 5 update. It is better before but I'm still getting the same bugs (albeit more rarely now).