This caricature of a stereotypical "new wave" rocker seems to fall under the domain of parody. That's a valid defense for copyright; less so for trademark.

But the irony is that McDonald's might actually want to lose this case, lest they strengthen the future cases of people who rip off McD's trademarked symbols.

Proof that "Happy Birthday" is not the worst:

From the pasta we make
To lasagna we bake
Ba ba ba ba
We’re wising you a happy birthday!

We hope you will remember
This fond event forever
We’re wishing you a happy birthday!

It’s like family and friends
At the Olive Garden
In the true Italiano way
Hey! Hey!

So if youre looking for some fun
Try Hospitaliano
Have a happy happy day
Hey!

This being Disney, I assume the 3d models are protected by some kind of draconian region-coded copy-proof quality-degrading DRM scheme?

Why would anyone spend money on this system? They already need to be checking IDs to put someone into the system as "unable to produce ID", and to allow people who later are able to produce ID, or are old enough that they are now legal.

Once you're checking IDs, what's the point of the camera system?

Comedy is when you fall into an open sewer and die. Tragedy is when I cut my finger.

The better version of this hack would be to also capture a close up photo of the victim right as the shock is being delivered. (I can't watch the video, so if they do indeed do that, my apologies.)

P.S. Your outrage at being shocked dramatically increases my pleasure at having shocked you. Take that!

Isn't this also the story about how the Church family got completely ripped off by someone who didn't have the decency to let them know what they had?

Placebo my ass. It completely cured my scurvy.

Seriously, tear-free onions? That's the problem the consumers are begging for? Hooray, let's wrap everything in nerf foam and paint it bright orange for safety's sake.

This is probably seen as a revolutionary product by marketers. I'm sure there's a poll that says "35% of consumers said they would eat more onions if they didn't make them tear up while cutting them." Those same people probably just don't like onions and are merely choosing a convenient rationalization for their dislike.

My answer to the marketplace: Sack up, you fucking wusses.

No mention of the Goatse Santa down at the bottom of that story?

I'm pretty sure this book came true.

Remember the Bush jacket bulge? The drooping face and occasional slurred speech? I'm pretty sure it's all evidence pointing towards the neural control system from this book.

It also protects valuable land from disuse,

I honestly don't understand what this means. How, exactly, does one define disuse? How does one establish that the land was not being used exactly as intended?

If you want your land to be wilderness or open space, no matter where you live, contact the state or the Nature Conservancy and find out who does Conservation Easements in your area.

If filing paperwork to use your land as you wish sounds reasonable to you, I believe you are under the thumb of the man.

Think of other situations.

I don't know... maybe there's some situations in which it makes sense. But let's think of *this* situation.

What these people did may not have been neighborly, but to portray it as a legal oddity is wrong.

This type of case, with similar circumstances, happens often? It sure feels surprising to me, and based on the reactions of most people here, I'm not alone. And even if it's the correct interpretation of existing law, that doesn't mean it's not a little bonkers.

I used Dvorak for about two years, in graduate school. I started because I was starting to develop RSI, and someone reported that Dvorak was easier on your hands.

However, I found the benefits minor at best. After a few months of Dvorak with no noticeable relief, I started concentrating on my ergonomics--keyboard height, how to hold your hands, how to sit, things like that. A few months of *that*, and I was on my way to freedom from RSI. A few years later, I switched back to QWERTY, and the RSI has not returned.

I do believe that some people may find RSI relief from a Dvorak layout, but I don't think it's a miracle cure. I wonder if people who re-learn to type Dvorak end up developing better ergonomics during the process, and that's what ends up helping them.

I also have my doubts about some of the touted benefits of Dvorak. To take the example above, sure, the semicolon's on the home row, but it's also under the pinky. Maybe the comma and period aren't on the home row, but they *do* get the more prestigious swear finger/ring finger positions.

(I do think there was at least one giant benefit to Dvorak: nobody will ever want to borrow your computer.)

Where are the Cheetos? Where's the Mountain Dew?

M, That's a great point! Many of the arguments thus far have boiled down to, "Sure, hobbyists are able to recognize harmless devices, but there's no way we could expect that of full-time professionals!" Ridonkulous.

If the police say, "I thought that could be a bomb. Thank goodness it was just a misunderstanding!" after realizing it is not a bomb, then... that is "profound irresponsiblity"?

This is all good fun, but do you really want improvised electronic devices on the plane with you?

Corporate electronics only, please!

I could easily see that girl getting in line, having someone see the breadboard and quite reasonably shout, "Holy crap it's a bomb". In the ensuing panic, 2 people are trampled to death.

See, I've had jobs where I had to work with, and transport, crappily-made breadboard projects, all over the time. I could easily imagine, say, the flat-earther from "The View" thinking these were bomb parts and freaking out, when in fact, they were Engineering 101 kits. I do not want to put my freedom and my life in the hands of people who do not bother to distinguish "homemade electronics" from "bomb".

I'm pretty sure that if I were in Boston, and got stopped by the police with the Engineering 101 project kits in my car, I'm pretty sure the headlines would read "HOAX CAR BOMBER CAPTURED". And there would be tons of people jumping up and down with glee that yet another freedom had been taken away, without a care at all about what we had lost.

It is not okay to do whatever you want, wherever you want, just because you happen to think it's cool. You cannot shout "fire" in a theater just because it amuses you, even if it's an art project, and you can't wear a circuit board into an airport for the exact same reason.

You can't shout "fire" in a crowded theater because that act, by itself, causes harm:

The most stringent protection of free speech would not protect a man falsely shouting fire in a theater and causing a panic. [...] The question in every case is whether the words used are used in such circumstances and are of such a nature as to create a clear and present danger that they will bring about the substantive evils that Congress has a right to prevent.

It's hard to argue that it's a clear and present danger when she wore the breadboard, clearly displayed, all over the streets of Boston, through the airport, at schoool, etc, without causing a panic.

And while we're at it, I can do whatever the hell I want, whenever I want, even stupid shit, as long as it doesn't cause a panic, because that's what freedom means. Which side of the "Live Free Or Die" equation are you on, anyway?

there were wires attached to a battery that actually lit up

She controls the technology of Edison! SHOOT HER!

@Lester Reale: Sweet.

Or hey, look at the crescent moon sometime! See that shadow?

I think you're having a senior poopy moment...you're thinking of a lunar eclipse

@bliss: The "An empty mind is a tidy mind" school of thought. Ridonkulous, but there it is. The correct frame is that the mind is a muscle, and the more you try to lift with it, the stronger it becomes.

But moving on to woman from "The View": The real problem is not that she is so completely dumb.

The problem is that she is dumb and yet profoundly confident in her dumbness--confident enough to expound on evolution, the shape of the planet, politics, everything under the sun, in front of a large audience, without a clue in the world, but without any sense of shame. I blame self-esteem schooling.

Lars, the link works fine for me.

What I'm amazed by is the symmetry of construction even during the early phases of the build.