pessimizer

A hostel is just like a hotel, except you usually don't get a room (unless you're willing to pony up an extra $20.) You're just looking for a cheap place to stay, but you don't want it to be scary. Ho…

In communes, you don't really do your own thing. I think you're talking about an apartment building where a lot of hackers live that has a hacking room instead of a gym. Or possibly efficiency apartme…

I've been thinking about it for years. The only problem is that most programmers seem to be status quo capitalists bordering on libertarian. It might be easier to teach hippies to program than program…

Qt. That way you get Symbian, Maemo, Meego, and Linux tablets, like the Shogo (embedded applications, like the QooQ on that have been pretty successful.) Qt for Android, Windows, and iPhone seem to be…

Fred Hampton was referred to by government officials at the time far more often as a criminal or as a terrorist than as a civil rights worker.

Would it seem right that the mold for casting a tin soldier would have the same detail as the tin soldier cast?

Isn't that the basic design philosophy of the iPhone? They seem to have done well.

I'm confused about what you mean here. Are you saying that no individual can net a positive return from any endeavor? Also, there's no reason to assume that a tuition fee would lower the obligations o…

I have no opinion about whether tuition fees in Scotland are warranted or not, I'm just saying that it's incoherent to say that tuition fees are being paid by the taxpayer after an announcement that t…

That's not more accurate. Tuition fees are fees introduced to supplement taxpayer support. If they are never introduced, it is bizarre to say that taxpayers are paying them.

An even better headline would be "A third of Milgram’s subjects told him to take a hike, hallelujah." It would have the benefit of being true.

The scientists made the film, too, so there's probably a less interesting explanation.

I think you're underestimating the attraction of drug dealing as an occupation. Its profit vs. risk ratio is a lot higher than kidnapping.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Apple_Corps_v_Apple_Computer

The estate is very litigious. Maybe try "Hendrux."

It really does. It's as if I was paying UPS to pick up my packages, but it only delivered 2/3 of them. I wouldn't be wracking my brain very long to come up with the same solution. My guess is that the…

I think the important question is what if you _do_ want to share that info, and other people are interested in hearing it, why aren't we talking about it? BTW, I'm always willing to share, and the res…

If the markets were actually science rather than the decision making of a few huge players - if the HFT algo writers take this research seriously, I bet it'd work for at least a day or two.

I can see exactly why they would think it was okay. What they were trying to do was to figure out whether twitter moods could predict the unpredictable random movements of the market, rather than the …

My hypothesis: This is just another indication that stock market speculation prices spend most of the time almost completely decoupled from the value of the underlying assets. Eventually there is some…

I disagree that the two are mutually exclusive, yes.

Politicians shouldn't be depended on to do anything but further their own interests. That's why we introduced democracy, in order to get their interests as closely aligned to the public interest as po…

There's no real definition of middle class, and when one is usually offered, such as $70,000, it's a higher income than 95% of the people in the world. So if the question is whether you would choose t…

I'm so glad you didn't mention purple. Everybody always says purple. I think it has to do with the people eater.

He's right, and it shouldn't. That's what governments and collective decision-making are for. Private individuals shouldn't be depended on to do anything but further their own interests, even in the c…

I'm not putting facebook crap in my will.

I would absolutely pay for this. I'm a hypochondriac and think that I'm just about to die for a different reason every day, and have a fear that some people that I keep in contact with on the internet…

Very stale. He moved on to other things:) But the code is available.

I'm surprised that no one has mentioned Rubberhose Deniable Encryption by Julian Assange of Wikileaks fame. That's the entire concept. Page: http://iq.org/~proff/rubberhose.org/ Description: http:/…

P2P search and p2p social networking. If you've already got p2p media sharing and streaming and bidirectional chatting and talking, you've pretty much remade the internet. You've pretty much remade al…