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Just to echo your point… USA >> EU US GDP = $23.3 trillion EU GDP = $15.8 trillion even if you counted UK (to make Europe rather than EU) UK GDP = $3.1 trillion

When I was at college I read that Margaret Thatcher slept just 4 hours per night, and I was so envious, wishing I had that extra time every day. Three years ago my wife and I had t…

Please drop me a line on me@mo.md. I am CEO of a UK start up that uses Java.

"Conceptually, if very smart people did it, and other very smart people say it can't be done" Don't forget the third part, which is what the author described, i.e. "not very smart …

If I had to guess, it would related to Du.ae, the UAE's second telecoms company - they have a duopoly.

Gulf Co-operation Council countries – Bahrain (my country), Kuwait, Oman, Qatar, Saudi Arabia, and UAE. They have separated citizenship from work visas. Anyone can come, they do no…

Some historical background, which includes plenty of personal bias: Governments, for all their posturing, love dealing with oligopolies, or even better, monopolies. They feel safer…

Let me tell you about the UK National Health Service. 1 million employees, they are literally saving people's lives every day, and all they are allowed to use is IE6. What your sta…

Agreed, this was my same thinking when I was in the USA until 2008. Sure, my employer and my wife's both offered to get us a green card, but why wait? I had applied to YC earlier t…

I bought the Kindle when it first out and loved it but never carried it with me, and found it difficult to read at night - so as soon as reader version came out for my Android, I u…

Because of satellite television, I would say classical - everyone will understand you, and although you will sound formal in your speech, you will also be able to read and write. H…

I wanted to add my opinion as an Arab (from Bahrain), which is nowhere as scholarly as yours (I am so in awe of your linguistic nerdiness, thanks for such a lovely article). Egypti…

It's not funny, it's inevitable - Arab and Israeli tribes were all Semites (which is why accusing Arabs of being anti-Semitic is annoying, as it implies that we are not Semites) th…

A couple of corrections I feel I have to make as an Arab. > There are the diacritics to think about, but outside of the Quran they are simply ignored. They are not ignored - when t…

The $20 he mentioned is for cablers and phone techs, not for programmers, if I understood correctly.

Sorry to "talk my book" as well - our start-up provides a personal health records system that is connecting the UK's providers where the government's master system approach has fai…

East Asian would do just fine. Just because the largest land mass in the world contains lots of people does not mean we have to label them together.

My wife hates Facebook - people keep on tagging her and our kids in photos, thus reversing our efforts at keeping our photos private. She only logs in so she can remove the tags.

I had thought the same thing until I read the comment from anigbrowl - police are not saying there is nothing to investigate, just that, in UK police jargon, there are no obvious s…

I do not agree with you, but regardless, the example you gave - South Africa - proves the point of the person you were replying to, i.e. they "won", so it is easier for them to for…

What you are describing is not American vs UK attitudes, it is the joys of being a foreigner encountering government bureaucracy designed to remind you that you are a foreigner. I …

It is scary, and they will fire you. That scared me a lot. My first job was with the US Federal Government (I was a scientist at NIH) who had nicer terms, plus a reputation of not …

I live in the UK (parents were exiled as pro-democracy activists) and appreciate the same freedom of religion that you describe and I experienced in the USA. No social pressure, so…

They already have a presence in Washington, DC, and have invested heavily in their newsdesk there. The problem is that no cable network will carry them, even though plenty of peopl…

My understanding was the same as yours above, but it seems that if there is a valuation event – an IPO, for example – then the rise in value of all shares is counted, not just the …