All plants want is a little water, a little sun, and a little company. And in return they’ll grow and change and reward you occasionally with explosions of beauty.

"I long have been fascinated by the extraordinary achievement from the ex-Paypal team and wonder about the reasons behind their success."

The law shields Internet services from claims of copyright infringement as long as they promptly remove illegal content when notified of a violation.

New Social Networking Site Changing The Way Oh, Christ, Forget It!

A hedge fund, Magnetar, helped create arcane mortgage-based instruments, pushed for risky things to go inside them and then bet against the investments.<br />
And make sure to listen to the full story (free streaming) on This American Life: http://www.thisamericanlife.org/radio-archives/episode/405/inside-job

"One of the main reasons "Arrested" was so beloved by some but alienating to most was that it required active viewing. They were going to take their 22 minutes and pack them so full of jokes, allusions, references and callbacks that you couldn't afford to blink. I'd say you have to watch each episode at least three times before you feel like you've finally caught everything — and even then, if you check out "Arrested" websites or boards you'll see people pointing out jokes that flew past you."

"Facebook's contention was robots.txt had no legal force and they could sue anyone for accessing their site even if they scrupulously obeyed the instructions it contained. The only legal way to access any web site with a crawler was to obtain prior written permission. Obviously this isn't the way the web has worked for the last 16 years since robots.txt was introduced, but my lawyer advised me that it had never been tested in court, and the legal costs alone of being a test case would bankrupt me."

"The iPad and iPhone are closed compared to personal computers, yes. But they are remarkably open compared to so many kinds of computing devices."

"Those words could stand alone as a monument to Wales’ wrongness – a warning for future generations on why we must never heed the advice of a man who calls himself ‘Jimbo’. But the very fact that Wales was invited to opine about the future of news at a major conference despite having no identifiable qualifications to do so compels me to elaborate. If people take his opinion on newspapers seriously enough to ask him to speak on the subject then there’s a terrifying possibility that they’ll take him seriously enough to act on his advice."

The real story of the completely unethical way that they are going about achieving that success. In short, for users who won’t pay cash, a wide variety of “offers” are available where they can get in-game currency in exchange for lead gen-type offers. Most of these offers are bad for consumers because it confusingly gets them to pay far more for in-game currency than if they just paid cash. And it’s also bad for legitimate advertisers.<br />
<br />
SMS subscription scams are among the most lucrative offers to game publishers because users get a recurring fee of $10 – $25 per month until they are able to terminate the subscription. Many users never notice them, and those that do usually have a lot of trouble getting them shut off.

I’ve been blatantly cheating at foursquare for the past week. Last Sunday, I wondered, “Can I become the mayor of the North Pole?”

"The iPhone and iPod touch lack the ability older iPods had to run in Disk Mode. That's where iPhone Explorer steps in, allowing you manually manage files on your device, or just use it as a flash drive, without jailbreaking. iPhone browser is a lightweight application that has an easy drag-and-drop interface that lets you browse the contents on your iPhone. You can manually transfer your photos, music or movies from your device back to your computer, or just add files to the iPhone and fill up the unused space as extra storage."

"Nobody checks the signature. Credit card signatures are a useless mechanism designed to make you feel safe, like airport security checks. So my question was, how crazy would I have to make my signature before someone would actually notice?"

"The Torn-Up Credit Card Application – I get a heck of a lot of credit card applications in the mail. I almost always tear credit card applications in half and throw them away. Is that good enough? Could a determined and dexterous criminal gather all the bits, tape them together and apply for a credit card in my name?"

The Rumpus: Do you save everything ever entered into Facebook at any time, whether or not it’s been deleted, untagged, and so forth?
Facebook Employee: That is essentially correct at this moment.
Rumpus: When you say “click on somebody’s profile,” you mean you save our viewing history?
Employee: That’s right.