I understand that it may benefit from features in Chrome, and it is fine that they want to let me know. What bothers me is that it is calling my browser "outdated" just because it doesn't support their favorite draft HTML5 feature. It comes off to me as more of a Chrome advertisement than a helpful notification.

I just signed up with Firefox 18 and got the message:
"Warning: You are using an outdated browser, which adversely affects your file transfer performance. Please upgrade to Google Chrome."
Seriously, Mega?

Sandboxing is great, but the real problem with Apple's sandboxing is that it gives no say to the user. Apple and the app developer get to decide what an app can or can't do, while the owner of the computer is stuck with the choice of accepting those permissions or not installing the app.

In other news, Congress accidentally approves arts funding.

I agree. He is an expert in video compression, not patent law. I think his argument as to VP8's patent status is flawed. He claims that VP8 is likely covered by patents because it shares many features with H.264. However, I suspect that these common features are those that are covered by known patents. A list of all known H.264 patents is available on MPEG-LA's website; therefore, it is public knowledge what features of H.264 are protected by known patents. However, nobody has been able to name a specific patent that VP8 violates. On2 surely must have reviewed this list when designing VP8, and borrowed all those features of H.264 that are not covered by known patents.

They wouldn't even have to torture anyone. All seven identities are known. Bruce Schneier named two in his blog, and all seven can be found in the comments.

It is true. It also applies to certain printer drivers and Adobe Photoshop. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/EURion_constellation

You know, we actually have a secure WiFi encryption protocol now. It is called WPA.

Because Starbucks is so commonplace in the "rural areas of the developing world."

It looks like a 3-clause BSD license to me... http://www.webmproject.org/license/software/

I am no expert on licenses, but according to GNU, the 3-clause BSD license used by WebM is GPL-compatible. http://www.gnu.org/licenses/license-list.html#GPLCompatibleLicenses

I have used VP8, and I'd also say "VP8 doesn't suck." I will agree that On2's website for it is misleading. I will also agree that H.264 does a better job of compressing video than VP8. However, just because VP8 falls short of the best performing format available doesn't mean it sucks. VP8 still is a good format, and I would argue that it is the best patent-free format for web video, assuming Google is correct about its patent status.

128-bit RC4 as used in SSL/TLS is not necessarily insecure. I know of no situation where the crypto has been directly broken in practice. Certain RC4-based systems, like WEP, have been broken in part due to flaws in RC4 but also from poor implementation. RC4 as used in HTTPS is still quite secure, even though AES is preferred. RC4 HTTPS seems completely acceptable for protecting most user's Google search terms. It has been successfully used to protect far more sensitive information.

Linux also supports detailed ACLs: http://www.suse.de/~agruen/acl/linux-acls/online/

SELinux is more about limiting what applications, not users, are allowed to do.