The way I understand master keys work is that the lock has two "breaks" in each pin, instead of just one. So each pin has two positions that allow the lock to open, and you don't know which one belongs to the master key.
I think at least two locks would be required, and depending on how many pins and possible positions there are, more might be needed in case of a collision.
How about looking at the number of people who must be removed in order to bring the bus factor down to 1? We can call it the "bus co-factor" :). With the bus factor we're picking the most critical people first, and removing the least number of them; with the bus co-factor we're picking the least critical people first, and removing the greatest number of them.
There's probably already some name and many theorems in graph theory for both of these ideas.
Text messages are only the relatively boring first step in this kind of project. If these guys go on to implement IP/Vodka they can proudly follow in the footsteps of such
hacks as RFC 1149 :-) "The network smells a little slow today"
I presume that the way the lucid dream induction works is by blinking an LED when the onset of REM sleep is detected. There are other products out there already that do this; the idea is that you'll train yourself to notice any blinking red lights or objects in your dreams and associate that with realizing that you're dreaming.
When the collar closes, its spoke will have pulled apart a little bit under the tension and widened the gap. You'd need some kind of motorized grabber-puller collars to make this work.
> "Peter Tyson is a human born in 1975 in New Zealand. He is the oldest son of Ron Tyson and Ann Tyson. In the Summer of 1996 Peter became a student at Auckland University. In the Summer of 1999 Peter became a student at Victoria University. In the Spring of 2000 Peter became an Analyst at Datamonitor. In the Spring of 2002 Peter became a Community Manager at Codemasters. In the Autumn of 2005 Peter became an Administrator in the New Zealand Government. In the Summer of 2008 Peter married Laura. In the Winter of 2009 Peter wrote popular tutorials for Dwarf Fortress on his blog, afteractionreporter.com. In the Winter of 2011 Peter was struck by a Strange Mood.
> In the Summer of 2012 Peter wrote "Pasubabo Thrathdad Teme", "Getting Started with Dwarf Fortress", a legendary wood-pulp paper bound book. The written portion consists of 180 page guide to the game Dwarf Fortress entitled "Getting Started with Dwarf Fortress". The writing is lighthearted with moments of humor.
> In Summer 2012 "Getting Started with Dwarf Fortress" was stored in O'Reilly by the human administrator, Peter Tyson."
I built a Prusa Mendel last year. It works... sort of. Unfortunately it's very unreliable and finicky, and takes a lot of babysitting to print anything. In theory I should now use it to print improved parts for itself to fix this; in practice it seems I don't have mechanical know-how to make a really reliable machine, nor (lately) the big blocks of time needed to experiment and learn. It's just been gathering dust for the past six months :-(
It may have started to happen to us already -- I'm sure there are a few people here who have gotten lost in the World of Warcraft dimension for a time.