If examine.com's metaanalsyses are based on legitimate research papers -- and you've read some of the papers yourself and find that they indeed provide support for the article citing them -- then i'd say yeah, use the site.
i guess to respond to your question: most biomedical research today is eminating from universities and university-affiliated entites. page for page, i generally wouldn't expect a .com web site -- the majority of which are probably just attempting to generate advertising revenue -- to be on par in terms of accuracy etc with a .edu site. generally, I've found one of the best ways to improve the signal-to-noise ratio is to filter to a specific set of domains (e.g., ,edu, .gov) when searching online.
" If this were any other manufacturer, they would be burnt at the stake."
Nah. Look at Samsung: you can make a TV that spies on you, a washing machine that explodes, and a smartphone that spontaneously catches on fire. And then go take a look at how their stock is doing this year.
We've reached the pavlovian phase of western consumer culture: we'll just keep on buying and buying and buying, no matter what.
in employment negotations, the only time you should start signing anything is when you have a job offer letter in hand with the salary you want, and the name of your manager, both in writing on that letter.
(rare exception: sometimes you might get asked to sign an NDA prior to being brought in for an onsite interview. even then, I would think very very carefully about signing it.)
My two cents: don't put companies on a pedestal -- we are certainly nothing special to them, after all. don't do anything you're not 100% comfortable about.
"This course material is only available in the iTunes U app on iPhone or iPad."
That's lame. For years, iTunes U materials used to be available in iTunes store, accessible via macOS and Windows. Now Apple wants me to buy an iPad? Hell no.
The proper way to improve education in a community is to get involved with the existing school systems -- the schools are already there. Be wary of ideologues possessing way too much money combined with an impoverished sense of ethics (e.g., Zuckerberg) who shun existing civic institutions and go off to start their own for-profit/corporate 'schools' instead.
When you have to threaten someone on your team, you've reached rock-bottom as a manager; all you're really accomplishing is convincing your team to leave for greener pastures.
Wasn't entirely sure if this was a sincere post, or some sort of unfunny burlesque of some kind. Assuming it's sincere, then the author of this blog post couldn't be more wrong about how to manage a software team. If a manager-type started going full-on micromanagement on me ("add a private var to this class now! rawr!"), bandies about the term 'insubordiation', and generally believes they're entitled to my unthinking obedience, then congrats: you've successfully convinced me to start floating my resume so I can get the hell out of that shitshow. I'm an educated, experienced software engineer with multiple degrees and life's too short to put up with that bullshit.
If you're going to go with a functional approach (which he introduces in the section "How to avoid 'this'"), instead of creating a brand-new function for each particular piece of data (e.g., setName, setGreeting) -- which will result in a ton of extra code -- just use a simple, generic assoc function.
"Inventing a class with its own interface to hold a piece of information is like inventing a new language to write every short story." -- Rich Hickey
"as far as we can all tell he is avoiding the horrible health effects"
No. Nicotine is a carcinogen. Forgive my surprise, but I'm absolutely blown away that this isn't common knowledge in 2017.
Edit: I appreciate the distinction that folks are making as far as what constitutes a carcinogen. Yes, the science we have today falls short of us classifying nicotine as a 'complete carcinogen'. If that makes you sleep better, then ok, but the science shows carcinogenicity in vitro, and substantial ability to promote tumor growth, metastasis, and recurrence in vivo [0][1][2][3].
Your friend is also potentially exposing himself and those around him to formaldehyde and diacetyl and so on, which is present in many e-cigarette liquids.
Folks: eat healthy, get a bit of exercise, read good books, and most of all, develop relationships with people you truly trust. If you find yourself needing to rely on smoking or drinking to get you through the week, take a step back and garbage-collect your life and decide if you're living the life you want, or if it's a life that's in need of radical restructuring.