Wow! Causing a fuel crisis is doing more to convert the world to clean energy sources than any accord ever could.

I just wanted to touch on your statement about radiation effects on humans being moderately well studied. The energy associated with the radiation is important and all radiation isn't created equally. The information on the effects of totally unshielded cosmic radiation exposure to humans is really limited to just the astronauts who flew to the moon. There were some studies done with particle accelerators and mice but that is about it.

Hmmm. In 20006 France passed the iPod law, which was covered here on Slashdot. However, parts of that law after it was passed were struck down. All governments have crazy laws, most of which are old and need to be updated. I disagree with the law, however it was put into place for an obvious reason. The problem is with the Internet, online sales and the general economy small mom and pop stores all over the world are being harmed. I do not think this law will save those stores anymore and as all old laws I'm sure this one will take years to get off the books.

Forgot to answer your other question. It does run a little slower. I don't notice any slow down in windows but under wine I occasionally notice a little jumpiness but only when there's a lot going on, but again that's just barely noticeable. my system is just an AMD Athalon 64 3700, 2G , GeForce 6600 w/128MB, nothing special