nekojima

I am very happy to have a numpad on my laptop (first time I've had one after five laptops without) and in all likelihood would only buy a laptop in the future with a numpad. The balancing issue took a few minutes to get used to, if I use on my lap, but otherwise, it was an easy adjustment to make. Using the numpad when entering figures into Excel or other programs is much easier than before when using the top-line of the keyboard, and no longer need to have a usb desktop keyboard around to help with that.

Canadian football also allows motion towards the line of scrimmage, which increases the tempo of the game & fun factor for the fans.

The figures per month vary massively from 15 in February to 114,844 in November 2012. Makes one wonder what sites are classified as pornographic and if the spikes occurring are the result of poor filtering.

Which is why I didn't read this the first day I saw it (the expletive), while at work. Only looking the second day it was up on the first page, when I was at home and curious why it was still popular.

"The Lives of Others" (Das Leben der Anderen) is an excellent German film that dramatically shows the intrusiveness of the Stasi (secret police) into daily life in the former East Germany.

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

In the film you can see some of the techniques used by Wolfgang Schmidt and his colleagues.

There is a fair amount of artificial cloud covering residential buildings in Singapore, plus some commercial, public and military sites. Some areas such as a diplomatic district might be understandable, though others like the odd HDB block less so. Having lived across the street from one HDB block now obscured by artificial clouds, I'm wondering who might live there that its a priority to block an aerial view.

Two of the Facebook pages with continuous updates:

https://www.facebook.com/geziparkidirenisi (330,000 Likes in less than 72 hours)

https://www.facebook.com/OccupyGezi

At least there are now (as this is posted) a lot of very positive and supportive comments on this upload of the video.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HPPj6viIBmU

How about a little bit of consistency for the Path url in the tweet. I know its now common practice, but this obscuring of links is what I have repeated told my family and many friends to avoid clicking on, so to avoid downloading viruses or going to sites they don't intend to.

For "bit.ly/PathHelp" the underlying url is "t.co/B4lOWrDqyr" and it redirects to "service.path.com/customer/portal/emails/new"

I'm sure there is a reason for it, but just having service.path.com or help.path.com would be more beneficial for the company to both have as a url and to tweet to (former) customers/users.

Paul Curtis was arrested by the FBI last week, and on Tuesday he was released without charges, when the FBI found there was zero evidence in pursue charges. But his name and face were among the top stories, not related to the Boston bombings, in the past week. Much like many of those wrongly and very publicly arrested, he will now have some troubles in the future from those who may still believe he was responsible. As we know, information on the Internet, for the most part, lasts forever.

"US drops case against ricin letter suspect Paul Curtis" http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-us-canada-22273355

“Look, we live in a very dangerous world. We know there are people who want to take away our freedoms. New Yorkers probably know that as much if not more than anybody else after the terrible tragedy of 9/11,” Bloomberg said.

The world is generally safer now than at almost any previous time, particularly for those of us that remember the Cold War and the early-mid 1980s, when even these measures weren't required to avoid mutually-assured destruction (MAD) by two super-powers and their proxies. The only people wanting to limit freedom are politicians in the pocket of those wanting to expand the myriad of security services of the state. This feeds into the projected paranoia of those citizens who fail to understand the true cost, chance, or opportunity of reducing terrorist activities. Of course there has to be an attempt to reduce terrorist activities, but its the internal processes and procedures in place currently between the myriad network of security services which need to be reformed drastically, not the further expansion of those security services or the reduction in freedoms.

Terrorism is an issue of public security, while before 1991 the Soviet Union (for the Western world at least) was an issue of national security. Issues of public security need to be treated as such, not over-inflated and treated incorrectly. This helps support the terrorists, not defeat them, as has been shown in almost every internal urban civil conflict in the past hundred years.

In business terminology, a common English phrase would be "first-mover disadvantage".

It didn't work, as the suspect was discovered after the curfew was over, by a man who had been inside his house all day. Had the man been outside his house earlier in the day, and seen the cover of his boat, its all but likely the suspect could have been apprehended 8-12 hours earlier.

“public exemption in cases of national security.”

This is a huge stretch for the definition of "national security" and not necessarily one that a US Attorney should be making in this case, lest courts rule against them for over-extension and they lose the privilege of invoking this exemption for the future.

Wargaming is appearing to be pro-active in encouraging their users to change passwords, by having a "Change your Password Event" that provides an in-game reward as an incentive.

http://worldoftanks.com/news/2240-change-your-password-event...

I'd feel much better if they explicitly forbid users from wearing this eyewear around children, in public toilets, beaches, swimming pools, shop changing rooms, or anywhere else its use could be utilized to fulfill a perversion (this assumes they have the camera). So basically, probably means they can just wear them at home.

Its been going on for seven decades, must be a very elaborate and highly organized April Fools joke.

http://www.raisins.org

Whether Cook means he is "sorry" or not, this type of kowtowing is what is required in mainland China in situations like this. Otherwise the corporate harassment would continue until products are banned, stores closed, or unilateral changes are forced on Apple by a government agency.

A quick Skype poll of mainland friends (as opposed to expat friends) in China found that of those who had Apple products, none said they'd ever had a problem with Apple's repair policies inside China. The problems were more likely with customers returning fake or far too out-of-warranty repair issues.

Chatting on the weekend to the Director of Marketing for a major local electronics firm in China, he felt it was a politically inspired anti-foreigner campaign and was sure other foreign brands would be harassed for their perceived "arrogance" in the coming weeks and months.

These banks were paying unsustainable high rates of interest to depositors, and to earn enough to cover their obligations, the banks invested in higher risk government and corporate bonds paying higher rates of interest. The dangers of a Greek debt collapse have been known since before they joined the Euro, this is why Greece's interest rates were higher than Germany's for many years before the crisis.

Turkish Cypriots must be very happy now that the Greek Cypriots rejected the peace settlement in 2004. Otherwise, they'd likely be bankrupt too.

It appears this is a current/chequing/checking account rather than the savings/deposit accounts that were originally reported to be subject to the special tax and which pay the ridiculous levels of interest (10%+).

The impact on local business is already being felt, both consumption & payment of supplies & salaries (and soon tax remittance), and imports will suffer significantly in the coming days and weeks too. Exports may well be paid for and the funds remain outside of Cyprus, further creating problems for the economy, as it goes almost all-cash and tax is evaded too. Credit card balances can not be paid off for now either.

It will be interesting to see how Russian mobsters (and various shades of business people) react to having millions/billions taken from them. I'd not want to be a Cypriot politician or banker having to say no to these guys.

From what I understand of the case, the cash was smuggled from the US to Mexico and deposited into accounts with HSBC based in Mexico. Consumer goods were then purchased in Mexico and shipped to Colombia and elsewhere (but not the US). While there should have been a lot more local oversight for money laundering, why should US government agencies have access to bank accounts in Mexico to determine if there has been money laundering activities?

This is a local matter, as it is in other jurisdictions, and the US can formally complain through the established channels, treaties, and agencies which allow for sanctions to be placed on banks and jurisdictions where there is excessive money laundering activities and low oversight.

I work as a Deputy Returning Officer for elections in Canada. This role (simply stated) involves distributing and counting ballots at a local polling station, and ensuring the Elections Act is followed. While I do not support disenfranchising the mentally disabled from voting, it should be recognized that often its a parent, spouse, or caregiver who is the one voting and making the choice for the mentally disabled voter. This can mean they are essentially voting twice, or more if they are assisting multiple people. In one case in the last federal election, I refused to allowed a man to assist both of his children to vote, instead his wife had to assist the second child. This was within the authority of the role and there was no problem.

As long as there are some safeguards in place the mentally disabled should be allowed to vote, or make the attempt. If you sat there for a few days and saw who came out to vote, you may rather wish they too weren't having an influence on helping to elect the next government or opposition parties.

Everyone knew the Canadian combat military mission in Afghanistan was finally going to end in 2011, when the Tim Hortons' outlet closed down. Donut availability can have a predictive (or reactive) nature.

Their research for the vision they have developed for the new SimCity had quite a different result from the basic Facebook poll I did earlier this week amongst my friends.

Self-selected responders replied to my post asking if they were interested in playing the new game as SP, MP or both, along with how many have purchased and how many would like to or will.

Of sixty responses, two chose MP only. Fifty-three both SP & MP(including sandbox option I hadn't initially mentioned), and five SP only. Three had purchased the game, all wanting refunds because a lack of SP and server issues (which had to do with their own connection issue in one case).

Over fifty had played one of the previous versions of SimCity. Almost none now wanted to buy/license this version, because of the issues, connectivity, and lack of SP gameplay.

Granted it was a small sample, not scientifically done, and self-selecting responders, but I very much doubt the sincerity of EA's reply that the "vision" they have developed for this new version is based on actual user feedback, or the users are an EA selected group designed to give that them the response they want.

"Pretty much any digital good you buy cannot be resold. Usually reselling your account under which you made such purchases is also not allowed. All in all its a shitty deal for anyone buying digital goods."

You aren't buying digital goods, you are either renting or buying a lease on those digital goods. The terms and conditions of those purchases of leases or by paying rent do not provide you with the same rights and obligations as a hard copy or un-DRM version would normally provide (either through terms and conditions or various national legislation & regulations). That is part of the agreement you make when you pay for digital goods.

It is for these reasons why I have stopped spending on large priced digital items and only buy a lease when the items are on significant discount, such as costing less than $10, or rent when substantially discounted. There are few things, including hot new games which I'd normally want to buy, that I'm willing to pay for a virtual copy. I have close to zero trust these services will be around in a few years, or that their servers are sufficient to not lose my purchase record in the coming year or two. While I'm sure I would get my $20-80 worth of use out of the game or book, the concept of the inevitable loss of the item is more important as an influence to me, than the utility & pleasure of the use of the item now.

Slightly higher rates would not be due to competition, but the reduced economies of scale and the perceived increased risk from relying on potentially fewer clients and a smaller loan book. A reduction in the Return on Equity could help to compensate to lower interest rate, but then the bank may not be as favoured or valued as highly by investors.

As well as the 225 scholarly reports, plus additional articles, on the dig sites. They exceeded almost all universities and archaeology units in the UK on an individual institution basis for output and quality of work. It may have been a TV series, but the folks doing the work were serious archaeologists who did real work, making a real contribution.

The technical advances used in archaeology illustrated over the past twenty years of this program have been phenomenal. While a trowel is still mandatory, the use of geophysics technology has advanced and assisted in fieldwork in so many ways. Highlighted by Time Team, its a shame to see that this won't be as public anymore to such a wide audience.

When we fly over New Hampshire in a commercial plane, does this mean the captain or flight attendants will be obligated to tell us not to take photos of the state from the air, if any buildings are visible or identifiable as buildings based on other landmarks? Unbelievably this has been possible for well over a century (including use of air ships), only now has it become an issue for excessive regulation.

A better (and perhaps cheaper) solution would be to use either Cities in Motion which has a good transportation model, or Cities XL (I'd suggest the 2011 version for price and performance over 2012) which has a good balanced play as the cities grow in size. These seem from initial new SC exposure, to be better models for teaching and from a learning perspective. As well the saved games feature (hardly a feature, more a necessity for most of us) is far more valuable for teaching lessons, which the new SC lacks.