iwr

For one, there are almost(?) no unclaimed patches of land available. If you look at a political map of the Pacific, most of it is locked up between the EEZ of various states and micro-states.

http://www.spc.int/aquaculture/images/stories/dfatpacific%20...

Most of these countries are also very poor (Africa levels) and heavy recipients of foreign aid. So politically, they are corrupt and inaccessible.

So the best bet is to build an oil-rig styled structure or a large ocean-going ship. However, both options go into the hundreds of millions to the billions; a super-rich individual is naturally mobile, so he doesn't need a fixed patch of land that he politically rules.

That said, you may be interested in this: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Seasteading

Most IPSs think that DNS is an afterthought, to be stuffed in an old box and forgotten. Typical scenario: wait for a request, deny that request, then cache and honor the request the second time round.

Thanks, I was not aware of that aspect.

The core of tyranny is Orwellian because there are people out to get power for its own sake. Still, Orwell's bitter pill has to be sugared with some Huxley before people are tricked into taking it.

Even in a Huxley's world, there would still be a shadowy elite running things. Hedonism was not an end (or an evil) in itself, but a tool to pacify the masses.

Hosts files. Given that storing megabyte-sized data is no problem, it can work even for individual users. Update your hosts off your peers in a web'o'trust fashion.

But DNS is the easiest thing to circumvent and hence, there will be pressure to create stronger control methods.

What are database rights?

Intellectual property is a misnomer, or at least a weaker form of property. It's not about free speech, but rather about the particulars of owning an idea which may reside in another mind. Calling it theft outright is framing the question. Of course people are against theft, but if their ideas of theft are different, they are referring to different things.

Furthermore, there are three distinct cases where IP is understood differently: trademarks, copyright and patents (I suspect you are referring to copyrights). Some people may be against only one or two forms of IP, while accepting the others.

That story sounds apocryphal. Why did it come up now?

Your best bet is geoIP: http://www.geoiptool.com/en/?IP=32.165.154.5

If you really want to track the person down, you may not to change the gmail password, then monitor the account for further intrusions. Note that a smart intruder will also be watching that page.

In case you have a keylogger, or have been phished, you may want to reformat the hard drive and reinstall everything. Also, if your gmail account is linked to your paypal or other sensitive accounts, you would have to change your passwords on those services as well. Also, secure your wifi.

Not the first precedent. Remember blogetery?

http://www.zdnet.com/news/blog-site-shut-down-after-potentia...

No commercial and centralized system is safe from censorship/seizure.

Technically, if Google is indexing sites accused of wrongdoing, the MPAA could force Google itself to filter search results (or serve them with a court order to do so).

On a wider scale, if you link to a site that links to another site, would you still be liable?

So ISPs would reverse-lookup all IPs requested by their customers, mapped onto a list of banned domains or naked IPs?

Is it really wise to build a financial transaction system on top of an unsecure GSM network?

Is it an explicit fee increase, or a removal of a fee cap already in place?

There are no known deaths or crippling longterm effects of THC, as opposed to alcohol.

These substances are significantly more dangerous than hash. They are periodically banned and so there is high churn of new concoctions. People have been smoking hash for thousands of years and it is probably the safest drug out there. But being illegal, it forces people to try out poorly tested substitutes. If you really want a high, better get the illegal stuff, it's safer.

There is no Dark Side of the Moon. The _far_ side receives as much sunlight as the other hemisphere.

Still, I don't see how the photons would be travelling at different velocities in the same medium.

Photons move at c in all frames of reference.

So reading more about this: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Photon_gas , it looks like a scenario where a blackbody container was created, with a Boltzmann "temperature" peak equal to the energy level of the incident photons. Thus, all absorbed photons would be re-emitted at with the same distribution as the blackbody walls. And apparently, this phenomenon was tested in an ultra-low temperature scenario.

Still, I wonder. Given the low temperatures, the Boltzmann distribution suggests photons in the microwave or lower frequencies.

What does "temperature" mean with regard to photons? A photon has an energy level given by its wavelength or frequency. But temperature is a macroscopic phenomenon (equivalent to the kinetic energy of a group of particles).

Once you JOIN Oracle, you have to abide by their referential constraints, otherwise the general employee database will TRIGGER a DELETE on your records.

Other factors have to be considered as well. The wealthy or super-wealthy (individuals or companies) are usually more mobile. A middle-class, working individual, with a mortgage, is pinned down to a greater degree. It also depends on the mobility of capital goods. If you have big, hard-to-move infrastructure, you are pinned down. "Patriotic" millionaires notwithstanding, turning the screw on the rich and mobile may just mean more capital flight. Screwing the heavy industries would just discourage investment in that sector (i.e. Detroit).

Already posted: http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=1937059

1. The HP CEO, Mark Hurd was forced to resign by his board.

2. Larry Ellison welcomes Hurd to join as co-CEO of Oracle.

3. HP sues Hurd for supposedly breaking the time-limited non-compete clause in his severance deal.

4. Ellison promises retribution.

5. HP's new CEO becomes Leo Apotheker, former SAP CEO.

6. Oracle's new target becomes SAP.

7. SAP is saddled with a lawsuit, Ellison "estimates" damages to $5bn.

8. SAP gets to pay $1.3bn.

So in conclusion: Ellison & Hurd didn't get their blood from HP, but are happy to settle for a cool billion from a third party.

At least it's not XSLT (technically Turing complete).

Second rule of Apple: one button and no more. If you need more, just use the on-screen buttons.

Are you aware of these square-hole adaptors being sold with standard drilling kits?

So in theory, a compact enough data store could have an explosive potential.

The shock meter could be certified and sealed by NIST or an agreed third party. The delivery company could then advertise as "the world leaders in package handling". Insurance companies would have a stake in this as well.