So the obvious good and bad has been mentioned before:

Good - enables longer range travel by quickly swapping out the battery instead of waiting (hours?) for it to charge.

Bad - you get a lovely new battery with your new car...only to have it swapped out by one years old which no longer holds as big a charge.

...the Ugly - membership fee?

Let me clarify that last. One of the issues I have with Hybrids is that they have batteries. While battery technology is getting better, they eventually will not be able to hold enough charge and will need to be replaced. Not sure if most owners think about that at the time they purchase their car. Likewise with the new eCars, their batteries will eventually have to be replaced. But wait...you are constantly swapping out batteries, so does that mean that you will not have to ever pay to replace your battery?

Someone has to eat the cost of the battery replacements. If it is a battery-swap business they will either charge you a good premium for the service or require you to pay a membership fee. A membership locks people in and limits competition. Add all of the infrastructure, distribution, inventory and other costs and this will be a convenient but pricey travel option.

One of the biggest threats to the Earth is overpopulation, so for all those Greenpeacers out there who have kids: shame on you you bunch of hypocrites.

Ok, let me get this straight....there is a tax on all devices that can store media (CD/DVD, etc) regardless of how I choose to use it because I MAY use them to store copyrighted content. So if I choose to place copyrghted content on a DVD, then I am performing a legal activity and am being taxed on it.

...but wait...they they are also telling me that copying that content is illegal. But it must be legal becasue they are taxing me on it. They can't have it both ways. "Well, it is illegal, but until we have a way to stop it we want to make as much money off it as possible." AND they are making law abiders pay a fee because they COULD use it that way?

Nice logic.

Well, sir, if I am going to pay a fee for doing it, I ight as well go ahead and get my money's worth.

How does that logic work for you?

IMy last processor, an Intel quad-core, was the first time I bought an Intel chip in years. After buying a box with a Pentium 100 MHz hip, I started bulding my own PCs and AMD was always the flavour of choice because they were....well, better. At the very least they were at least as good and definitely cheaper..

I went with Intel this last time because they improved. I did what was best for me at the time, but I still felt like a traitor. After all....the reason Intel was able to catch up was because they beat down AMD by ensuring a limited market for their CPUs. Less sales, less revenue, less money available to R&D new CPUs.

It was in the news....we all talked about it and cursed. It burns me that it took this long for something to happen. I still do not think that the U.S. would be bringing this action if Intel hadn't already lost it's previous legal battle.

As much as I like the idea of Intel not getting away with what they did, the fact the the money is not going to AMD to be put towards new CPU development is a problem. AMD is improving but, as a result of Intel's previous actions, still has a lot of catching up to do. Intel will now suffer reduction in cash to put to R&D. So.....Intel potentialy loses more money which does not lead to better or cheaper CPUs for the consumer. AMD gets nothing, which again does not lead to any benefit by the consumer. The only ones benefiting now are government and the legal carreers of prosecutors who smell the blod in the water.

While I have not seen the picture in question, I have seen the movie and recall the scene and can create a pretty good mental image of what the picture in question looks like. I can't say I'd want little Timmy and Sally to have a gander at this, but despite the nudity, there is a lot of other aspects to the picture that would draw your attention (the hands in the roots). While containing nudity, the picure itself does not seem to promote an overyly erotic image.

While not something I would normally have watched, I am a fan of horror (non-slasher style) movies and the title drew me in. The movie was disturbing and will best be enjoyed by people with an open mind and thinkers. This is not a movie that you sit down, turn off your brain and enjoy the ride. There are issues and meanings that you can discuss/argue about with others afterwards.

Still....not for the faint of heart. Park your morality at the door or stay out as this will mess you up if you aren't prepared for it.

If I can lift my head out of this cesspool of blame-assigning, company bashing 'tards I have a neutral opinion.

For all three companies this is the time to buck up and just fix it. Everyone is so afraid of being in the wrong. Guess what? Shit happens. While I would love to do bisiness with a company that never produced an error, y next wish would be a company that would acknowledge the possibility of an error and put some resources (ncluding cross-company cooperation) to get it resolved ofr me ASAP.

Intel needs this fixed or risks it's reputation and sales.

Microsoft needs this fixed - they have what (from personal experience) appears to be their best OS yet and need to keep customer confidence high if they are to pull themselves back up.

Apple needs this fixed because 1) they need their phones and iTunes to work on what is still the largest segment of the OS market, and 2) to have future potential MAC computer buyers remain confident in the harware behind their OS.

Now....just everyone stop pointing fingers and fix the stupid thing!!!!

Apple needs this fixed

I just didn't put it in and clicked next. I believe there was a screen for Microsoft's EULA, which I did agree to but I have yet to enter my CD-key.

I also either declined to check (or perhaps unchecked) the option to Activate Windows when I connected. That was one of the prompts during the install. I checked the taskbar and there was no indicator like the little yellow shield from XP/Vista telling me how many days I had left to activate my copy. At this point I assume it will hit some pre-programmed time limit and eventually prompt me.

I know the CD-key is on the inside flap of my box and expect to have to use it, just not sure if/when it will force the issue, or if the fact that something went wrong....I will not be prompted for the info, and will have to re-install.

The biggest question for me is:why it didn't even prompt for an old XP/Vista CD. This was not what I expected. It would be nice to go ahead and update my wife's PC also, but I want to keep the key available just in case.

I purchased a new HDD to use with Win7 (upgrade pre-ordered back in June) and had removed the HDD containing Vista. Despite backing up my data I did not want to take a chance that I missed anything. Plus if aything went wrong I would be immediately back where I started.

Now the strange part.

I booted from the upgrade and followed the prompt for a Custom install. The complete install took about 20 minutes. I had my Vista CD handy expecting to be prompted to put it in for validation....but it never happened!! There was no other HDD connected at the time so there was no other way for it to validate that it was a legitimate upgrade. I'm happy with the way it went, and it was certainly more convenient, but it flies in the face of everything I heard.

Note: I also skipped the prompt for the CD-key during the install. Knowing that MS limits the activations I wanted to be sure that everything was working (programs re-installed, files restored from backups, etc.) before I activated it. I have not yet received the pop-up reminder to activate windows, but it's only been 2 days. I believe with Vista you had 21 days...not sure what it is with Win7.

Anyone else out there able to skip the CD on a clean install with the upgrade?

Rebates are a way to coax you into a deal with potential lower costs. In this case you pay $200 up front, with the manufacturer offreing to send you $100 after you make your purchase. and they will. This is an additional "sale" over whatever local merchants charge.

The catch for the consumer is that they generally have to clip the code off the box, and send in a copy of their receipt....then wait up to 6 weeks to get their rebate. For those who are good about doing this correclty and immediately they get a $100 additional savings.

The benefit to the manufacturer is that they can lure consumers in with the promise of hte rebate, knowing full well that <50% will ever actually mail in the rebate request. Generally hte larger the rebate the more likely the consumer will follow through. Smaller rebates have <20% follow through.

IF you follow instructions you can potentially get a larger rebate than would otherwise be available. The manufacters get to promise a bigger rebate and draw in extra sales knowing that in reality the actual rebate per unit sold will just be a fraction of what they offer.

Some stores have easy online rebates where you submit a form online....no paper, no postage. This is the preferred way to go and it's in the stores best interest to get you the rebate as it costs them nothing.

Chip and Pin is here, but not rolling out very quickly. My cards have all been upgraded/replaced but not everyon's has. Add that to the fact that merchants seem even slower on the uptake and there will be problems. Even our chipped cards have the old magnetic stripe for use where merchants have the old equipment.

....and let us not forget consumer laziness. I was at a restaurant last week, and a person I was with had the waiter take his CC away to be swiped because he was too lazy to get up and go ot the machine to use his PIN. Some places have portables that let you use your CC at the table, but I''m not sure if these have been upgraded yet.

Fortunately for us, Canada is a rather unique name, and while properly referred to as Canadians, we are generally ok with the term Canuck as it is generally used in a friendly manner.

When we refer to the people of the United States of America, we refer to them as “Americans”, not “Americans of the United States” or “United States Americans”. The term “American” refers to nationality, not geographic location and also refers to those not living in North America (e.g.: Hawaii).

As for geographic location, Lewis should have referred to the country as “U.S.A.”, or even U.S. would have been ok. Americans use “America” because saying “The United States of America” is too wordy and, let’s face it, we all know to what they are referring. But out of respect for all countries “U.S.A.” would not only have been more accurate, it would have been fewer characters to mash out on the keyboard.

<<Stereotype mode = ON>>

My work here is done, eh? Time to go to Tim's for my 'double double' to wake up so I can go for some beer!