d2vid

How many teacups we talkin here?

In 2011 there were about 500K utility patent applications: http://www.uspto.gov/web/offices/ac/ido/oeip/taf/us_stat.htm Many of those are not software related.

There are about 1.3M programmers in the US alone: http://programmers.stackexchange.com/questions/19720/where-c...

So 20 teacups each to have each patent looked over 10 times? Sounds doable to me.

Regarding the treble damages for having read a patent - since these are patent applications, not granted patents, perhaps one could argue that one didn't know it was actually granted?

Not true regarding 46 ancestors - chromosomal DNA is swapped between the homologous chromosomes during meiosis: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Meiosis#Prophase_I

You are correct about mitochondrial DNA.

I found a dime when I was a child and swallowed it - maybe my parents should have sued the US Mint.

Opportunity cost. If we're comparing it to annual income, we should compare to the annual income of the median mobile developer, which is less than $80k.

> The notional size of the derivatives involved is on the order of $360 trillion.

Total worldwide wealth is estimated at only $200 trillion. These derivatives are not serving their useful function as a hedge and are instead being widely used for speculation.

http://www.zerohedge.com/article/detailed-look-global-wealth...

Punchcards are a form of price discrimination - only customers who are price conscious will keep the paper card in their wallet and remember it every time. Price-insensitive customers still pay full price.

From the store's perspective, the inconvenience is a feature.

It depends on the quantity of people who were spied on. If it is everyone, then it means nothing. If it is you and a few "terrorists", then people will draw conclusions.

Could one take real recorded noise and add that rather than noise generated via algorithm? Wouldn't that force attackers to solve a real problem (removing background noise from an speech sample)?

This. I think many people don't think they are susceptible to these biases because every time they encounter one, it is in the context of reading about biases and thus they are primed to be on the lookout for trickiness.

I guess "many people" includes me - I always thought I was good at these types of questions, maybe I'm not :(

Agreed. Thinking intelligent people can better resist biases makes as much sense as saying that handsome people can. In both cases the halo effect is at work.

> That second screenshot is most troubling, as the title does not match the query (i.e. that copy was built.)

Did you mean to say that the first screenshot was more troubling? That is the one where the user searched "meetingburner" and the ad copy says "Meeting Burner Software | GoToMeeting.com"

> in a process called saccadic suppression, we are effectively blind for at least 2 hrs of the day. This is why you cannot see your own eyes moving when you look in a mirror!

False! Stare into your own eyes in a mirror and turn your head left and right while continuing to look at your eyes. You can see your eyes moving left to right in their sockets.

Saccades may blind you, but the only reason you can't see your eyes in the mirror is because changing your gaze means you're not looking at your own eyes anymore. What silly "evidence"...

How about it raises the costs of coordinating a conspiracy - it signals to other protest groups that if someone starts suggesting violence, you should decline because they might be an agent. That could then prevent violence in cases where no undercover agents have infiltrated the group.

I still think the tactic is unethical, but this is one way it could be effective.

I found that interesting as well. The problem is that people predict that a generous return policy will make them happy, and they are more likely to purchase if you give them what they predict will make them happy, not what will actually make them happy.

Perhaps they will be more likely to refer friends to your service if you don't give them a return policy, since rationalization will kick in and they will make themselves happier with your service if they're stuck with it.

It would also be nice if there were an example showing the code necessary for integration.

I tried dragging the street view dude onto the monster, but unfortunately no battle ensued ;(

>"[I]f tomorrow air passengers were offered the option of a 'secure' flight on which all passengers are subject to security, or a 'non-secure' one where they could go straight to boarding, hassle-free," he writes, "I promise you that many travellers would still take the 'secure' option."

I would take the "secure" option because who is left taking the "non-secure" option? Terrorists.

If all the flights were "non-secure", just like every train ride, then we spread the terrorists out and my odds are better.

No affiliation. I think they might contact you to get quotes for media about how cool it would be and to notify you of their progress.

My girlfriend told me about this because she gets blood clots from hormonal birth control and we wish this was an option today.

You should complete this survey like I did if you are interested: http://www.surveymonkey.com/s/TSKSKGM

>unfounded prejudice is unstable in a competitive market for labor.

Only with perfect information. In the absence of straightforward tests to evaluate job applicant quality, discrimination can unfortunately be a stable and rational strategy (albeit morally wrong and illegal). Because of information asymmetries, the employer can use race as a signal to infer lower quality. By rejecting minority candidates, the average quality of their applicant pool increases.

See page 494 of this paper for which George Akerlof won the Nobel Prize: http://web.usal.es/~emmam/Docencia/Modelizacion/papers/The%2...

Agreed that banning IQ tests may be misguided, as you point out the solution is to add more information to the market.

I kept reading the article and looking for something that would give this away as an early April Fools joke.

> you're going to be limited to > 45 year old females with Stage IV glioblastoma expressing marker Y

If the drug is approved for a specific use in a specific demographic, then doctors can choose to prescribe it for other uses and to other demographics. Apparently 50% of cancer patients receive an "off-label" drug: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Off-label_use#Frequency_of_off-...

Mint was acquired by Intuit, they did not IPO: https://www.mint.com/press/intuit-to-acquire-mint-com/

> I neither own nor possess my apartment

In a legal sense, a renter actually does possess their apartment (but they do not own it): http://legal-dictionary.thefreedictionary.com/possession

When will this certificate be available on MITx?

If you have an electric car and get a permit you can drive in the carpool lane alone: http://www.arb.ca.gov/msprog/carpool/carpool.htm

He is saying 5% have invalid P3P headers. Most of the rest do not have P3P headers at all, see: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/P3P#Criticisms

In Britain (where this case was tried), the law is different. If you don't mention facts that you will rely upon in court, it can harm your defense. Shutting up is not as much of an option:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Miranda_warning#England_and_Wal...

Weatherbill is now named climate.com