I agree that 3kW is a little on the high side, 2400W is very common in 240V countries. That is because these countries normally specify 15A wires, and and 10A circuit breakers, so if you pull the maximum out of the socket that you are allowed to, you can pull 2400W For example, 2400W articles:

• Kettle: http://www.philips.com.ph/c/tea-and-boiling/viva-collection-1.0l-2400w-1-cup-ind.-white-lavender-hd4676_40/prd/
• Hairdryer: http://www.amazon.com/Turbo-5000-Professional-Dryer-Watts/dp/B008DI7WBQ

According to energy.gov, clothes dryers use 1800-5000W, although the latter are surely industrial as they would need to sit on a three phase socket This still raises the question as to how long you really need to boil water for 2400W for a minute or two is not going to significantly shorten the life of the battery pack in the article.

The problem with expecting the public to do anything is that they won't. You need to do something. Join the EFF, write your legislator, turn up to council meetings. And when you say that this is too hard, realize that you are the public, and that they won't do anything

Freedom of Speech does not imply the freedom to be a dick.

The [French] Declaration provides for freedom of expression in Article 11, states that:

"The free communication of ideas and opinions is one of the most precious of the rights of man. Every citizen may, accordingly, speak, write, and print with freedom, but shall be responsible for such abuses of this freedom as shall be defined by law."[6]

According to the Freedom Forum Organization, legal systems, and society at large, recognize limits on the freedom of speech, particularly when freedom of speech conflicts with other values or rights.[36] Limitations to freedom of speech may follow the "harm principle" or the "offense principle", for example in the case of pornography or hate speech.[37] Limitations to freedom of speech may occur through legal sanction or social disapprobation, or both.[38]

In "On Liberty" (1859) John Stuart Mill argued that "...there ought to exist the fullest liberty of professing and discussing, as a matter of ethical conviction, any doctrine, however immoral it may be considered."[38] Mill argues that the fullest liberty of expression is required to push arguments to their logical limits, rather than the limits of social embarrassment. However, Mill also introduced what is known as the harm principle, in placing the following limitation on free expression: "the only purpose for which power can be rightfully exercised over any member of a civilized community, against his will, is to prevent harm to others."[38]

See Wikipedia

To quote from the summary:

I would have been satisfied with the free credit protection. Now that they want to offer me 2 games, why can't I pick any 2 games that I want?

Seriously! Stop whinging. If they are giving you more than you wanted, just accept the extra, or throw it in the bin. But don't come here whinging about it, that is just needless whinging.

Paris is not the first city to implement such a ban on "gas guzzlers", many German cities already do this.

Add to that, that in most places small winnings such as these are tax free... that 12-15K per month becomes equivalent to 18-30K a month, depending on your tax regime. There aren't many who would turn that down... However, there is also a non-trivial chance that it wouldn't last for that long, especially not once the trick was noticed. As well, most scratchie based schemes are only around for six months or so. And you might well get a lawsuit about committing fraud if you were ever caught, which, even if you eventually win, would also add to your operating costs.

Possibly, from the article:

That is this material has been known about for quite some time, however it's applications to electronics are only now being investigated, and he initial results appear to be quite favourable.

If you really had to look it up, the least you could do is provide the link

That said, assuming that you are a software engineer, you really should have come across that term before, it's been around for 20 years, and in common use for at least ten.

This would appear to be the case, as they have updated the story to point to Google's blog post on the crankshaft update.

I am surprised that no-one has mentioned Russian Ark as a good candidate for a long shot. This is a one shot ninety minute movie. Very impressive, and awesome scenery as well.

Aw crap... wrong story to add the comment to Why doesn't /. have a delete my post button!

I am surprised that no-one has mentioned Russian Ark as a good candidate for a long shot. This is a one shot ninety minute movie. Very impressive, and awesome scenery as well.

Update 21, which fixes some, and possibly these, vulnerabilities was released in July, Update 22 however was released last week.

The grandparent probably has customers using Eclipse, the only program that I know of to have the problem, there may well be others, but they are not in as wide-spread use.

However, Oracle has already fixed that problem, so the GP is just trolling.

http://ianskerrett.wordpress.com/2010/07/29/oracle-demostrates-great-community-support-and-fixes-eclipse/
http://bugs.sun.com/bugdatabase/view_bug.do?bug_id=6969236
http://bewarethepenguin.blogspot.com/2010/07/tip-of-hat-to-oracle.html

That is a valid point about the communications, however, from the article, if incorrect data is sent by something pretending to be the tire gauge, it was enough to corrupt the controller to the point where even a simple reboot was not enough to fix it. It had to be replaced by the dealer. Certainly resources need to be allocated wisely however when the device crashes due to invalid inputs, that is at best annoying, at worst very expensive to repair.