Thankfully this isn't an ideological choice, it's a bloody sensible one based on real science.

FWIW Imperial College (London) recently shut down its nuclear reactor...

Not true. There's a fantastic cockpit video of a pilot rendered unconscious through high-G, where the onboard computer determines a crash will happen and maneuvers out of the situation (upwards). Yes, it's not an airline, but it's a good example of a time where reverting to full-automatic saved at least one life.

Ummm... that thing about Disney measles. Not sure who's telling you what, but you might want to check the CDC's report on it. Unless (of course) you think they're in in "the conspiracy" too.

Thanks for the second article/link, it really helps this sort of discussion.

As you've bothered to cite it I dare say you've read it though and agree with it. The last paragraph was particularly helpful. It starts with:

"Given the effectiveness of the MMR vaccine in eliminating both measles and rubella, and the highly infectious nature of these diseases, high vaccination coverage is essential. The diseases that the vaccines are preventing are not benign and vaccination can eliminate many of the serious sequelae of these infections"

Perhaps I'm not alone in thinking a currently should be stable....

Or rather, just copy the exam conditions in the UK. No watches, no devices at all other than the prescribed calculator, and from what I understand you must even be willing to show the memory of this... Also, clear pencil cases, clear water bottles.

I don't yet, although when playing with VMs it might be helpful. it helps I'm using Linux only and I'm not bad at reducing memory footprint.
It's certainly a problem for some academics/developers playing with large chunks of data.

Combine the two, such as when you need to run a Windows only application in a VM (ArcGIS springs to mind) and *that* is used to look at a large dataset... 16GB can feel awfully restrictive.

Niche to Apple perhaps, but there are an awful lot of h/w manufacturers very happy to go way above 16GB RAM.

That RAM limitation really has been an issue for some people. That we can now go to 32GB on DDR4 will makean enormous difference.

Not sure if anyone actually wants to follow the cnet link in TFA, but it's broken. Here's a working one: https://ancillary-proxy.atarimworker.io?url=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.cnet.com%2Fuk%2Fnews%2Fu...

If every manufacturer decided to make seatbelts unsafe (and lied about it), would you consider that a civil protest or a criminal action?

Many corporations breaking the rules in an effort to save money doesn't make it right in any way shape or form.

I first read "An Introduction to Elvish" (http://tolkiengateway.net/wiki/An_Introduction_to_Elvish) some twenty years ago, and I was astonished to learn the detail behind Tolkein's language work, in particular the history of the language, and the theory behind its evolution. When inventing a language, how much do you consider its development - not as its creator, but as a person observing its changes throughout time?

I was a little unexcited by (although interested in) the article, even by the general speedups until I got to the part about VM replication. This really makes an enormous difference.

ZFS licensing has kept this as a grey area for me, so I I've largely kept away from deployment (save for an emergency FreeNAS box I needed in a hurry), but I'd clearly benefit from looking here again. Thanks for the reminder.

Oh, I also appreciate the rsync.net advertisement. Good guys, good service ;-)

Umm... that nugget of strangeness (cows/kittens etc) was added today, by IP 218.17.240.71, with no citation. Note this is that IP's first Wikipedia edit. Not really what I'd call reliable.

I think there might be other reasons for young people moving away. Their narrow-minded elders, a town council willing to be swayed by nonsensical arguments, the simple pure idiocy that seems to prevail. The people who stay are happy with the situation (or just can't get out).