Reshared post from +Jim Fawcette

Don't Buy Mobile Phone Insurance

SFGate.com's James Temple does a follow-up on his stolen cell phone and explains why getting insurance isn't worthwhile.

* Deductibles are high, such as AT&T's $199 for the iPhone
* You're not guaranteed a true replacement even with insurance. "Replacement equipment may, at our option, be refurbished equipment or different equipment of like kind and quality."
* Cracked displays may not be covered. 
* Loss due to nuclear war isn't covered (really! both fission and fusion)
* If the carrier doesn't provide adequate coverage, you've signed away your right to sue.

Temple: "Instead of buying insurance, Consumer Reports recommends that consumers hold onto their previous phone and simply switch back for the remaining term of the contract in the case of a loss. "

Reshared post from +Dan Gillmor

Bill Nye deserves the thanks of anyone who wants actual science to be taught in science classes.

America's economic competitors hope he'll fail, of course — they want US schoolchildren to learn religious myths rather than reality.

Southeast Michigan and particularly Dearborn is home to what is reputed to be the largest concentration of Arabs anywhere outside of the Middle East. Many if not most of those people of Arab descent are Muslims of various sects including both Shia and Sunni, but many are also Christians and there are even atheists. 

Those Arabs live side by side with people descended from Europe, South Asia, the Far East and just about everywhere else practicing Christianity, Buddhism, Hinduism, Sihkism and every other faith or lack thereof under the sun. For the most part they coexist in relative harmony aside from the usual crap that afflicts any urban center, pretty much anywhere in the world. They all live under the same laws as Americans anywhere else in the country. 

Left to their own devices, the vast majority of people will just try to go about their own daily lives, earning a living, raising families, and trying to have a little fun along the way. Being in a continuous stay of conflict is just too damn hard. No matter what part of the political or religious spectrum you hail from, extremism is never a good thing. If that's what you want, please go find yourself an enclave in rural Idaho and keep to yourself. 

Leave us peaceful folk alone!

Reshared post from +Phil Nickinson

“When you have a fire in an aircraft, there’s no place to go, exactly, there’s no — and you can’t find any oxygen from outside the aircraft to get in the aircraft, because the windows don’t open. I don’t know why they don’t do that. It’s a real problem."