Hey, the 50% chance of crashing when you try to do a commit just makes it that extra bit exciting.

The incredibly slow, unreliable reporting of commits to pull/push also resulted in the fun situation of having a resolved marge conflict I couldn't push because there were commits I needed to pull and it wouldn't let me pull changes because I had an unpushed merge. After an hour of trying to find out how I could fix this, the solution ended up being "delete the local repository and do it all again".

Have you not noticed the trend towards automatic silent updates without the user knowing in consumer hardware?

The Wii U will do system updates automatically in standby mode, large numbers of ISP provided routers do background updates, Lots of TV Set Top Boxes will (Sky have certainly been doing them for a long time) and there's doubtlessly numerous other examples of connected consumer HW that do potentially bricking updates without user input. Heck if it wasn't for the fact that a majority of android devices are battery powered , I'd wager that would automatically update it in the same was it does for the built software

Given modern day motherboards almost always have either dual bios or other failsafe recovery modes, the risk of bricking from updates has been miniscule for a long time

Since when has a company had any responsibility for an update bricking a system because of it getting interrupted by external issues? Why should a software manufacturer be responsible for damage caused by your crappy power infrastructure?

You have full control over the information you send to Google. You can choose not to allow JS, you can choose not to allow cookies, you can spoof your metadata. The information you send to google is 100% voluntary, down to the settings and software you use,

Even still, the "my computer is using resources so this gives me a right to the site" argument is poor. It's like saying you have a right for someone to bend to your demands because you had to use your mouth to ask them and then used your ears and brain to receive their response

It's the site owners who are entitled? Slashdot is a parody of itself sometimes.

They can deliver the content in whatever means they want. Don't like it? Don't visit. Google are under no obligation to deliver content in a way that meets you personal preferences. You don't have a right to ad free content. You can try to bypass or not receive this content but Google are perfectly free to come up with ways to ensure they won't serve you one thing without the other.

You have no automatic right to access their servers and content and it's perfectly within their rights to control access, just like you as a user can turn off JS and disable cookies.

Like the legal agreement Apple Computer made with Apple Corp never to enter the music business in return for keeping the Apple Computer name?

Apple decided to enter the music business, Apple Corp. sued, lost and had to pay £2m to the company that had infringed on their trademark, thanks to that agreement. In the face of an army of lawyers, not only do these agreements offer minimal protection, they can actually make your position weaker.

A few places that sell downloads in the UK were offering the game for around £18 if you pre-ordered. Considering the RRP is £39.99. The prices then shoot up post launch.

The price is not going to get that low again for 6 months or so, so pre-ordering isn't that dumb.

I believe almost all of the self parking cars currently available to the public more accurately described as hands free more than completely automated. From what I gather, the driver is still required to operate the pedals (for liability purposes rather than technical reasons).

It was the driver's responsibility to operate it safely (ie not stamp on the accelerator and actually look at what's ahead), the fact that a premium feature could have compensated for the idiot behind the wheel is moot. It's akin to driving straight at a brick wall then complaining that the accident was caused by a car company not giving you "brick wall avoidance" as a feature in your model rather than you doing something stupid.

You need very little of the face to positively ID someone. Especially is you've already a suspect to directly compare it to.

You certainly didn't listen to his words that's for sure.

If you had read what he said in the article, he's talking about when installing CCTV aimed at eye level so it captures facial features rather than having them in positions where you couldn't identify a burglar. He's not telling everyone to get CCTV, he's telling people who are going to use CCTV to make sure you're not wasting your money by capturing just the top of someone's head as they rob you.

If you had CCTV footage of a crime, you have long been required to hand it over if the police ask for it. This has been the law for as long as CCTV has existed and I imagine this is the case in most countries. It's evidence of a crime.

You can't refuse to give it to the police any more than you can refuse to let the police look at a suspicious bloodstain in your house when you're being investigated for murder.

Given the number of mobile providers in the UK has been shrinking fairly dramatically recently, having another big player with big pockets and likely aggressive pricing enter the market is a good thing.

Theme parks are vanity investments. You largely invest in them so you can say "our portfolio includes theme parks...". Nobody does vanity investments like the oil rich counties.

They're massive risks and the UK is home to the world's second largest theme park Operator, Merlin Entertainment (probably most famous internationally for running the legoland parks). This theme park will be under an hours drive from 3 different Merlin owned Theme Parks (in addition to the London Dungeons and Madam Tussaud's) .

The field sobriety tests is designed for catching alcohol. 2 out of the 3 tests in the link you provided specifically say that failing them is associated with having consumed too much alcohol. The only one that doesn't specifically state as being about alcohol still only tests for a very specific impairment common to being drunk .

It's not a straw man, it's a perfectly valid comparison.

There have been hundreds of articles primarily about death threats towards people involved in this saga over the last couple of months.

When Penny Arcade or Jack Thompson received death threats, they were halfway down the article, generally a single paragraph, usually in articles condemning them. There were very few articles primarily about the death threats. There was a tone of "well serves them write for not apologising for that comic" among a lot of the gaming media. There certainly wasn't anything approaching a universal blanket condemnation. As far as I know, Giant Bomb were the only major site that did make it the focus of an article.