Can I pay in cookies? I have a couple duodecillion.

Japan doesn't use sirens (except for evacuation orders I think), they use a feature of the cellphone network to provide warnings (see https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/... and the Japanese edition of that page)
I believe (but am not 100% sure) that the cheap network or phone that I'm using doesn't support this, and just uses standard Google/Apple push notifications.
The Japanese wikipedia page says that the current system in use (ETWS) takes about 4 seconds to transmit these notifications.
Also, though I haven't lived in the currently earthquake-prone areas of Japan for a couple years, you often end up not getting any notifications.
If California's app uses Google/Apple push notifications, that doesn't seem very good, as these notifications may be dropped or delayed whenever the service doesn't feel like delivering stuff. But who knows, maybe they're capable enough?

Obligatory comic/animation: https://www.youtube.com/watch?...

Do you think there is merit to this story? http://www.globaltimes.cn/cont...

"Two Northwest China officials were punished after their plan to reduce air pollution readings by spraying water cannons near monitoring equipment backfired and left a government building encrusted in ice."

Thank you for the only? useful comment in this thread. If the editor is listening, it might have been useful to have had this information in the summary.

Here's some information from the article on the legal loopholes:

That sounds much better than "up to four years". Very refreshing to see a headline that understates research results :)

Coincidentally, "jama" means somethign like hindrance/obstacle/nuisance in Japanese. :)

Yeah, keeping it short can be pretty difficult sometimes. It's a useful skill to have. For example when you need to tell someone something without wasting much time, like when you are in a hurry.

One time I wrote a long email to someone. And they only skimmed it and then asked questions that were directly answered in the email.

Ever since, I've been keeping my messages short so no one can claim that their pet piece of information was not included in my email. For example, that one time someone asked a really stupid question, and I thought the shortest possible way to answer would be to call the guy a moron. It was very effective. I have no doubt that the guy understood every word in my email. Despite being a moron.

Calling people morons isn't very good either, however. I once called a guy a moron, and he wasn't too happy about it. I could see it in his facial expression. It's good to be able to read facial expressions. He also came running after me, which I would have understood even if I hadn't read his expression though.

So to summarize: under many circumstances it might be better to keep it short rather than long, because people might misunderstand you otherwise, but there is a fine line between a good concise statement and insulting people.

Thank you for your attention. Please also read my previous comment about the meaning of life.

55% of all workers have a commute that takes longer than one hour according to this article: http://toyokeizai.net/articles...
Direct link to info graphic: http://tk.ismcdn.jp/mwimgs/4/0... (maybe you can sort of read it without speaking Japanese)
Based on personal experience and the fact that tech workers don't get paid all that much, this is unlikely to be much different for tech workers. 24 minutes is _maybe_ possible for people who work at Rakuten, which recently moved to the Kanagawa-prefecture border of Tokyo.
(Note: I just recently moved far away from Tokyo to Shimane because of the long commute times.)

Here's some more relevant information: http://blog.trailofbits.com/20...
The person who wrote this article quotes what exactly the FBI is wanting Apple to do, claims that Apple is very well capable of complying with the order, even if it were a 5S or later, and that the FBI should be able to get up to one code test per 80 ms.

Defacing a website: 2 years in prison
Defacing a building: kids will be kids

Graffiti is a huge problem in Germany. All the graffiti is really embarrassing when I'm in Berlin with people from abroad.
Less graffiti probably means more tourists and less service outages because the train you were supposed to take is currently being cleaned, so there you get your tax dollars right back. (Not to mention that getting caught means you have to foot the bill for the removal of your graffiti, and I'm pretty sure it wouldn't be too much of a hassle to get you to pay some fraction of whatever the drones and their infrastructure cost, too.)
And most important, less graffiti also means fewer people stressed from eye cancer, and possibly fewer people who think it's okay to be a criminal.

Provided to you with much <3.

Under the suspicion of having created a computer virus, Kyoto Prefectural Police have taken into custody a 13-year-old eighth-grader living in Tokyo, Akiruno City, and notified the children's welfare center, based on the youth's misconduct of virus creation (skipping translation of official name of crime, which is provided here as well).

According to the announcement, a male student created a virus last year, on August 5, that forcibly shuts down computers. His deed has been recognized as a misconduct/misdemeanor.

The male student was at the helm of a membership-based site where hackers exchange information. "I was interested in hacking and wanted to study hacking, and created the site in August last year," he explains.

Kyoto Prectural Police have also arrested a suspect, a 23-year-old contruction worker from East Yamato City in Tokyo (name is in the article, but I don't agree that it should be published at this stage so I won't romanize it. Google Translate probably did it anyway though), who gave technical lessons on that site, under the suspicion that he had stored a virus on his home computer that deletes files on computers without permission.

(July 5, 2012, Yomiuri-Shimbun)

EFF donor here. I wish the EFF could keep their noses out of stuff not to do with rights in the electronic world. Why should I care what agencies fly US military drones?

Recently read a book that is exactly on the same topic as the book referenced in the article. It's called "The Lights in the Tunnel," and you can get it from the author's site for a price you can set yourself. I read it and thought it was insightful.

According to his ideas, things won't be free. However, people will get a salary without "working" per se. The author recommends maintaining a market economy. There will be some jobs left, but most people will receive a salary directly from the government. The government sets incentives, such as getting a good education, and behaving in an environmentally sound way. If you go after these incentives, your salary is increased. Education keeps crime rates low, and behaving in an environmentally responsible manner is good for everyone.

It's definitely a decent read, and I think things may well play out the way the author thinks.