Slashdot Mirror

One such product is the Asus LS201 -- a TFT monitor with a protective panel made of crystal-sapphire. Our Asus rep says not only is it scratch-proof, but it's also 'punch-proof'. We were dared to hit it as hard as we could and told it wouldn't break.

Never ones to shirk from a challenge, we formed an orderly queue and gleefully punched the hell out of our first LS201 sample. Unfortunately one of our punchers was wearing a ring, and the offending jewellery left a 2cm scratch on the supposedly scratch-proof monitor.

Asus sent us a replacement and politely asked us to remove any jewellery before we let rip. We duly obliged, but instead of emerging unscathed, the LS201 developed a small, unidentifiable blemish below the protective panel. It wasn't a scratch or a dent -- it looked more like a small piece of fluff.

Our verdict: the LS201 will not shatter into a million pieces when punched (don't try this at home). It's therefore ideal if you're the type of person who likes to attack inanimate objects, or just drop blameless pieces of technology. But it's most definitely not scratch-proof -- we don't care what the stickers say.

Anything around here that allows you to hook up to a PC is ridiculously expensive and works like crap, and they still reserve the right to mysteriously cap your "unlimited" usage or to bill you extra if you go over that limit. That's the plans that do allow hooking up to a PC at all. Mine, like many, is "unlimited" for the phone, but I still have to pay per kB to hook it to another device and let that use the connection.

There was a news story not long ago about a guy on a plan like mine in Canada who ran up an $85,000 phone bill because he didn't see the distinction in the fine print. Yahoo, DSL Reports, The Huffington Post, CNet UK, Canada.com, Geek.com, and /.'s own Firehose have had the story, among many other sources.

I can get Sprint, AT&T, or possibly Verizon (haven't check on their coverage and plans here lately for data) here that will allow me to hook up to my PC for "unlimited" data transfer, but it runs about $100 a month on top of a required voice plan, and although most phones will do it only certain phones or a dedicated cell modem is allowed to have the plan. Sprint says theirs is both "unlimited" and "broadband", but they also say it's not to be used to replace a leased line Internet service. So which is it?

Nokia N810
and/or
ASUS Eee PC
and/or
OLPC Give One Get One

Pleo

Arduino
iPod Touch 16GB (jailbroken)
Apple Tablet (will have to wait for January. Or when hell freezes over.)

http://crave.cnet.co.uk/gadgets/0,39029552,49293700-8,00.htm

Sure it's a piece of crap for 2000 but did it take them 7 years to figure that out? Or have they been including this all seven years. Fucking ridiculous - right up that nutcase Dvorak's alley.

Who cares about Vista... the interesting one is Barcode Battler!

Instead of spending gobs of cash on Pokemon Cards or Magic Cards or whatever other type of card game you play, you can raid the cupboard, grab some barcodes and make your own decks to play against your friends.

I bet if the sarcastic doofus reviewing it had read the instructions before starting his review, he might have gotten more out of it.

Now, where do I get one of these things...

The abundance of "lists as articles" makes me want to vomit, but this one takes the cake. They just randomly put down ten tech mistakes in an ad-baiting format (click here to see the next on the list - we won't tell you what it is, but if you click here, we'll get more ad revenue!). What's the time period? What are the criteria for selection?

I clicked through and saw the Number 8 off switch, took one look at the picture and thought THAT IS A TURN OFF!

Then they started talking about Data having an off switch in his leg. Wasn't it on his back?

What a godawful format. This is 2007, our web browsers have scrollbars for a reason. It's like a damn PPT, but with ads. Though, I suppose that's no surprise with articles like "Top ten geek haircuts" and "Top ten off switches". And no, I'm not kidding.
Journalistic integrity, thy name is CNET.

What a godawful format. This is 2007, our web browsers have scrollbars for a reason. It's like a damn PPT, but with ads. Though, I suppose that's no surprise with articles like "Top ten geek haircuts" and "Top ten off switches". And no, I'm not kidding.
Journalistic integrity, thy name is CNET.

I actually have switch two on a machine I use for audio recording because Mollys can be grown ups too!

This is the power outlet: http://crave.cnet.co.uk/0,39029477,49293357-7,00.htm

A proper, UK 13 amp power outlet, with rocker switch.

Why, oh why can't the rest of Europe adopt this standard?

Beef

Also...

http://crave.cnet.co.uk/0,39029477,49293357-11,00.htm

isn't that a power outlet?

Usually that's a lead-in to some bullshit dating article...too bad toggle switches don't apply in that field!

I guess they just found the OFF-switch of the C-Net servers... :-S

http://downtime.cnet.co.uk/cnet-down.html

Look at the article's photo:
http://crave.cnet.co.uk/laptops/0,39029450,49293967,00.htm

Now look at the MODbook
http://eshop.macsales.com/Customized_Pages/modbook/modbook_info_p1.html

The frame around the tablet in the article looks whiter, which I put down to light reflecting at a different angle to the MODbook photo. The key feature here is the oddly-shaped piece around the camera. It's identical in both images. I think it very unlikely Apple would lift that design from a third party.

The illustrations are bland enough to be worthless.

The photo is of a device already existing, that people desperate for an Apple tablet can buy today. I think it has normal warranty support, but the non-Apple-ness of the mod may turn people off.

I don't believe tablet PCs are a worthwhile area for Apple. They may be nice and have some real niches, but I don't see that they're successful enough to warrant an Apple model. I may well be wrong, but I'll only believe in them when I see them released on the Apple website or through some official communication.

Rumours about Apple products are almost always wrong, and there are a few stock market 'analysts' (read: "profiteers") out there who feed rumours, short the stock and make money out of the inevitable stock dip when it turns out the rumour was false after all. I completely distrust any rumours about companies these days, there are too many people with too many conflicting motives.

Did anyone notice that this comparison of the tariff pointed to here:

http://crave.cnet.co.uk/mobiles/0,39029453,49292876-1,00.htm

is purposely misleading?

It says up front that the article is about tariff comparison and that comparing the prices of the handsets are not fair because "you can't get an iPhone on the other networks." Yet each comparison ends up with a "total price" for each tariff where the O2 one includes the retail price of the iPhone and the other one does not. Either they are comparing tariff and handset cost together or they are not. Which is it?

In the three comparisons, it's 585, 360, or 585 pounds for the non-iPhone tariffs vs. 899 for the iPhone one.
It should be 630 for the O2 iPhone tariff not 899.

Don't get me wrong, am an avid Apple fan when it comes to some of their products, but the lack of flexibility with the iPhone is causing me concern. I have played with an LG Prada, which while lacking the raw power of an iPhone or Nokia N95, for example, does more than people think and has a great GUI. And from the video on this CNET Review it looks like their new 3G equipped Viewty now fixes the flaws in the Prada and does even more, such as the cool slo mo video and a haptic touch screen. The iPhone exists simply as a cash cow for Apple, and it's lack of flexibility could well mean it will only ever occupy the same portion of the market as their other non-iPod hardware while most of the world will purchase devices they can tailor to their requirements with memory expansion and a more open OS. While I do not believe the Viewty has a developer friendly OS, it is equipped with 3G & HSDPA and so will prove ideal for web services that can make up for lack of any more sophisticated on board applications. I want one, and I was going to get an iPhone. Probably not any more. Tell me I'm wrong.

...and the horse they rode in on. Anyway, here's page 3, slashdot. (picture of a jock wearing taped glasses and a necktie... what nerd wears a necktie? who would confuse C|NET with a nerd site or even a tech site? These asshats are clueless)

SLASHDOT
What's the story?
Slashdot is a well-respected science and technology news aggregation Web site. It lists user-submitted news stories with a bias towards geeks. Each story is vetted by a moderator before being posted, at which point visitors can leave their opinions in Slashdot's highly active forums. It was created in September 1997 by Rob 'CmdrTaco' Malda, who still runs the site.

The first Slashdot submission was recorded on 31 December 1997. By 18 August 2004 it had recorded 10 million posts. During this time its users helped create a unique subculture that was responsible for the propagation of several Internet memes. Among these were Al Gore's spurious claim to have invented the Internet, Chuck Norris' refusal to use email because he comes from the cowboy generation, and countless hyperlink-related 'pranks' involving the Goatse phenomenon.

Slashdot's core audience is thought primarily to be Linux users. Contrary to popular opinion, however, over half of its visitors use a Windows PC. Approximately a third use some form of Linux, with 10 per cent using Mac OS X.

Did you know?
Before Slashdot was Slashdot, it was known as 'Chips & Dips'. The site was launched in July 1997 but less than three months later it was renamed. The name Slashdot was allegedly chosen to confuse those poor souls who pronounce the full URL of the site ("h-t-t-p-colon-slash-slash-
slashdot-dot-org"). You've got to love geek humour.

What Slashdot says about you
Slashdot's tagline is "news for nerds", so no prizes for guessing what type of people visit the site. The average male Slashdot user probably looks a lot like our model -- but has more acne and bigger glasses. Users are 23 years old but look twice their age and steadfastly refuse to accept the fact that Windows is actually not a bad operating system.

Far from being lovable dorks, the Slashdotters have a vicious streak. They hunt like spiders, awaiting the arrival of an article from their victims -- usually a hapless news reporter. The second moderators accept a story, they pounce -- pedantry, suspicion and anonymity their weapons of choice.

They're the best sort of people to be around. They're highly educated...

and almost NSFW!

Behold!, the article is slightly more reader-friendly. Still not worth reading, though...

I was wondering why, in mid-April, I got a bunch of extra email from Nigerian princes. Then, I followed the link in the story, and found this.

If you look at the article the whole idea seems rather silly due to extremely limited screen real estate. It would be much better to do this idea in conjunction with this Sharp TV/Monitor that was announced a while back: http://news.cnet.co.uk/monitors/0,39029684,3919085 1,00.htm

That way each user gets the full monitor but can be using the two operating systems completely separately. That way you get the same physical real estate being taken up and don't have to buy two completely different machines. Still, I don't think the idea in general is overly practical. Can you imagine sharing your cubicle with Bob the slob working right next to you all day every day?

Unashamedly using the troll FP to get this up there, but comment readers should be aware that the summary is, in fact, wrong. (Shock horror, eh kids?)

The quote of a tie in the battle is not the last page in the article - In fact, Vista wins the contest 3-2.

The white balance is all over the map. The N95 shot looks good, but only because of the subject matter. The particular objects happen to look better with a blue cast. The N95 white balance is actually way, way off. If you look at the image with a color meter, you can see that the white areas are actually very purple.

n95 : 160,158,165 (5.1); 225,212,227 (11.5); 208,210,210 (1.6)
400d: 174,145,106 (48.3); 232,199,168 (45.3); 219,187,146 (51.7)

Can you look at those numbers and still argue both cameras are equally wrong? It isn't even close! The D400's error is many times that of the n95 in this particular image.

There's no question an SLR can capture motion better and reduce depth of field much more than a cellphone cam. But I don't think there's any question that most people want white things to look white when they shoot under tungsten lighting, and in this particular image, those other subtleties are hard to notice compared to the strong brown cast on Canon image.

Sure, it would be a mistake to draw general conclusions like "dSLR's have bad auto white balance" from one image from one model. I'm just surprised anybody can look down that page of photos with their own eyes and not admit that, in this particular case, the best looking image is from a cell phone.

It's not their methodology that I question, it's their eyesight.

There are some seriously shit pictures in that article. I mean, really bad. They might be acceptable for eBay, but then again, I used to use a 680x480 toy that downloaded over the serial port for taking photos for eBay. It's not exactly a high standard.

With the exception of the Nokia N95, which I do admit is impressive for a camera phone, the natural light photos are terribly yellow. They remark "the colours came out fairly balanced if not a little yellow..." about the top one of these two images. A little yellow? Look, Mr M&M there looks like he needs to get on dialysis, because his kidneys are shot. There's no white balance at all. It's tough to take the rest of their conclusions seriously when that's all they have to say there.

With the flash on, it gets the color right (apparently it's just hardwired for the 5000K flash or whatever it has in there), but all the highlights blow out -- and it's not even that high-contrast a scene. I'd hate to see what would have happened on a black background.

The N95 is, admittedly, impressive with its flash turned off. It's a pretty passable image at that resolution. I don't have much negative to say about it. But the flash image below, which they describe as "vibrant"...? I'm not sure 'oversaturated' covers it; it's bordering on ridiculous. It's not even attractive oversaturation, like you might get on some consumer films designed for that effect (Agfa Ultra, Velvia, etc.), or by playing in photoshop; it's just ugly.

Now, granted, in the 400D's photos (last page), they're doing something wrong in the available-light shot, because although they say they're using the automatic settings, it's obviously not auto-white-balancing, and I know that camera will do that in its automatic modes. Leaving that aside, the flash shot beats anything out of any of those cellphones, by a large margin. The lighting is pretty even (there are a few hot spots on the cat, but given that it was straight front flash, it could be worse), the highlights aren't blown, the colors are realistic, and the shadow detail is good.

The photos tell the tale far better than their narrative does: you get what you pay for.

It's not their methodology that I question, it's their eyesight.

There are some seriously shit pictures in that article. I mean, really bad. They might be acceptable for eBay, but then again, I used to use a 680x480 toy that downloaded over the serial port for taking photos for eBay. It's not exactly a high standard.

With the exception of the Nokia N95, which I do admit is impressive for a camera phone, the natural light photos are terribly yellow. They remark "the colours came out fairly balanced if not a little yellow..." about the top one of these two images. A little yellow? Look, Mr M&M there looks like he needs to get on dialysis, because his kidneys are shot. There's no white balance at all. It's tough to take the rest of their conclusions seriously when that's all they have to say there.

With the flash on, it gets the color right (apparently it's just hardwired for the 5000K flash or whatever it has in there), but all the highlights blow out -- and it's not even that high-contrast a scene. I'd hate to see what would have happened on a black background.

The N95 is, admittedly, impressive with its flash turned off. It's a pretty passable image at that resolution. I don't have much negative to say about it. But the flash image below, which they describe as "vibrant"...? I'm not sure 'oversaturated' covers it; it's bordering on ridiculous. It's not even attractive oversaturation, like you might get on some consumer films designed for that effect (Agfa Ultra, Velvia, etc.), or by playing in photoshop; it's just ugly.

Now, granted, in the 400D's photos (last page), they're doing something wrong in the available-light shot, because although they say they're using the automatic settings, it's obviously not auto-white-balancing, and I know that camera will do that in its automatic modes. Leaving that aside, the flash shot beats anything out of any of those cellphones, by a large margin. The lighting is pretty even (there are a few hot spots on the cat, but given that it was straight front flash, it could be worse), the highlights aren't blown, the colors are realistic, and the shadow detail is good.

The photos tell the tale far better than their narrative does: you get what you pay for.

Here is a side by side comparison of the photos. Ok it really is vertical but you get the point:

http://crave.cnet.co.uk/mobiles/0,39029453,4928992 7-6,00.htm

Sorry, but the quality of the majority of the phones tell me that dslr cameras don't have anything to worry about. This may affect the purchases of disposable cameras; the kind bought at local drug stores but not dslr's.

Disclaimer: I do not own a dslr nor do I own a camera phone.

Just look at the "medium light" images, which looks best? Which would you rather hang on your wall? The one from the N95. Vibrancy has nothing to do with it. Compared to the real camera images, the n95 image has better white balance, so it's the better image. And yes, you can tell without seeing the original scene. That ping-pong ball should be white.

My own experience is that "enough light" is absent more than it's present.

Still, the medium light photos were taken in indoor lighting, and that n95 shot looks good. Its only advantage over the real camera images is better white balance, but then again proper white balance is pretty darn important. (And, yes, you could manually adjust the dSLR's white balance either before or after the shot (if it were taken in RAW), and, no, that doesn't make bad auto white balance OK).

I think for the most part the analysts are lying when they say Microsoft or Sony is losing hundreds of dollars on each console. When you look into all these pricings, they generally including costs that are comparable to retail.

Not to mention that when you look at this article:
      http://www.ps3focus.com/archives/167
It claimed a $100 loss if Sony sold at $500. But the retail is closer to $600 suggesting at worst Sony is breaking even.

But then you look at this article:
        http://news.cnet.co.uk/gamesgear/0,39029682,492853 30,00.htm
Which suggests at $600 Sony is losing $240.

I say it's all nonsense. I think Sony & Microsoft like this analysis of pricing because people lap it up and think "Oh gee, for $600, I'm getting something worth almost twice as much! What a deal!". It plays on greed.

The only people who know how much the console makes (or doesn't make) aren't saying. Everybody else is talking out of their ass. Everybody.

I haven't checked this one for inaccuracies yet, but the last two were pretty stupid and, in some cases, contained completely distorted information.

This one from the first list still bothers me:
Torvalds' personal mascot is a penguin, he invented Linux using an old 386 PC and he insists he is named after a character in the Peanuts comic strip -- in fact he was named after Linus Pauling, the Nobel Prize-winning chemist. Torvalds' operating system is used by computers all over the world and some believe it poses a serious threat to Microsoft's Windows -- not bad for a lone Computer Science student.

...maybe Richard Stallman isn't so crazy with the GNU/Linux thing, eh? Although there are many packages in the average distro that aren't GNU's...

I tried to think of an explaination for #10 being on the Top Ten Girl Geeks list but I had to give up before my head exploded.

Agreed. There is no excuse for that. And why isn't Hedy Lamar on that list?

I tried to think of an explaination for #10 being on the Top Ten Girl Geeks list but I had to give up before my head exploded.

Based on the meta-tags in the article, this is the second in CNET's series of top 10 geeks.

A quick search on their site came up with this, their list of top 10 nerds and geeks overall.

Guess what, not a single female in the bunch. And no ficticious characters. Worst of all, it includes CmdrTaco!

BTW...the article was apparently written by one of CNETs editors...Chris Stevens (see here for a profile...he's about halfway down the page. And he looks like such a nice young man...

Based on the meta-tags in the article, this is the second in CNET's series of top 10 geeks.

A quick search on their site came up with this, their list of top 10 nerds and geeks overall.

Guess what, not a single female in the bunch. And no ficticious characters. Worst of all, it includes CmdrTaco!

BTW...the article was apparently written by one of CNETs editors...Chris Stevens (see here for a profile...he's about halfway down the page. And he looks like such a nice young man...

BAN on in-game Gay Guilds http://www.boingboing.net/2006/02/07/ban_on_gayfri endly_g.html http://www.joystiq.com/2006/01/31/blizzard-vs-gaym ers-are-other-minorities-next/ http://news.cnet.co.uk/gamesgear/0,39029682,492491 57,00.htm http://arstechnica.com/news.ars/post/20060207-6129 .html In case you are still reading impaired, notice the word 'BAN' in all those article titles? Notice the threat of being banned by WOW? They threatened to ban people for talking about being gay. Whether anyone was banned or not is irrelevant because the threatened to ban people for talking about being gay. And that was their policy until the community backlash caused them to change their mind. So what part of Blizzard threatening to ban gay players are you confused about? Just for the record, this took all of two seconds to find in Google. So now not only are you wrong but you are also apparently incompetent at researching your own info. Sucks to be you.

At this point, they've lost at least two customers. (which DELL will be picking up shortly...)

Looking at it's keyboard in this video I'd have to say that I'm very worried about my hand hitting the touchpad by mistake and making the mouse fly everywhere.

Actually, record sales are up.

(BTW, Slashdot's "Slow down, cowboy" comment sucks)

In order to critique the quality of journalism in this piece, one needs to understand the nature of journalism itself first. In order to educate the uneducated I have provided links with information (however limited) on the topics addressed.

The first example I would like to present is an investigative report on the subject, written by Colin Barker over at cnet UK, located here. You might notice that in this report, the journalist provides information he was able to collect on the subject, without influencing the article with his own opinions.

The second example is what we know as an editorial on the same subject. This one is written by Chris Stevens at Crave Talk, a column hosted on cnet UK (which I suppose makes this a "leader" instead of an editorial) and readable here. You may notice that in an editorial, the journalist provides only what information is necessary for the reader to generate an opinion subjectively (much like the above journalist has done) and expound with his own opinion before encouraging others.

Many writers of editorial columns are "personalities", journalists who make characters of themselves to expand their readership. A known personality is Ann Landers, who wrote as "Dear Abby" for so many years. These personalities can be witty, humorous, sarcastic, or outright cruel.

The above journalist has posted a counter-point to the Cnet article, attacking Chris Stevens's abilities as a journalist who generated his article largely based on opinion. He attacks the definition of spam without expanding on his argument by explaining what spam really is, then goes on to attack what he calls "irresponsible" journalism.

He then goes on to attack the reform system of the United States justice system, for a U.K. case. His responses to comments in this regard, to paraphrase, are statements that the editorial article does not indicate that it took place in the U.K., so how was he to know? He has taken it upon himself to act as a representative of the media (despite attacking the media) and therefore makes himself responsible for fact checking, which he does not do. That he could not research and find the above investigative report indicates that he did not try, or is simply a bad fact checker.

This journalist's opinion is that the above journalist is unprofessional, unresearched and uninformed on the topics he writes on, he has no journalistic background, and has no place commenting in the realm of modern journalism. Thank you.

In order to critique the quality of journalism in this piece, one needs to understand the nature of journalism itself first. In order to educate the uneducated I have provided links with information (however limited) on the topics addressed.

The first example I would like to present is an investigative report on the subject, written by Colin Barker over at cnet UK, located here. You might notice that in this report, the journalist provides information he was able to collect on the subject, without influencing the article with his own opinions.

The second example is what we know as an editorial on the same subject. This one is written by Chris Stevens at Crave Talk, a column hosted on cnet UK (which I suppose makes this a "leader" instead of an editorial) and readable here. You may notice that in an editorial, the journalist provides only what information is necessary for the reader to generate an opinion subjectively (much like the above journalist has done) and expound with his own opinion before encouraging others.

Many writers of editorial columns are "personalities", journalists who make characters of themselves to expand their readership. A known personality is Ann Landers, who wrote as "Dear Abby" for so many years. These personalities can be witty, humorous, sarcastic, or outright cruel.

The above journalist has posted a counter-point to the Cnet article, attacking Chris Stevens's abilities as a journalist who generated his article largely based on opinion. He attacks the definition of spam without expanding on his argument by explaining what spam really is, then goes on to attack what he calls "irresponsible" journalism.

He then goes on to attack the reform system of the United States justice system, for a U.K. case. His responses to comments in this regard, to paraphrase, are statements that the editorial article does not indicate that it took place in the U.K., so how was he to know? He has taken it upon himself to act as a representative of the media (despite attacking the media) and therefore makes himself responsible for fact checking, which he does not do. That he could not research and find the above investigative report indicates that he did not try, or is simply a bad fact checker.

This journalist's opinion is that the above journalist is unprofessional, unresearched and uninformed on the topics he writes on, he has no journalistic background, and has no place commenting in the realm of modern journalism. Thank you.

UK spammer gets two months in bedroom
Colin Barker
ZDNet UK

A UK teenager pleaded guilty on Wednesday to breaking the Computer Misuse Act by crashing the email server of his former employer.
David Lennon, 18, was then sentenced to a two-month curfew by a judge in the Wimbledon Magistrates court.

UK spammer gets two months in bedroom
Colin Barker
ZDNet UK

A UK teenager pleaded guilty on Wednesday to breaking the Computer Misuse Act by crashing the email server of his former employer.
David Lennon, 18, was then sentenced to a two-month curfew by a judge in the Wimbledon Magistrates court.

they recommend carrying it in a bag.

Currently (10am @ GMT -4) on the main page of Slashdot you can read this blurb:

"CNET reports that the British Government today attributed the country's 22% rise in street crime to iPod robberies. This has hit CNET close to home. Guy Cocker, a CNET (Gamespot) journalist based in London, was mugged last week. The muggers held 'a semi-automatic weapon to the back of Cocker's head and told him, "we're taking all your stuff"'. CNET's solution to the problem is suggestions on how to conceal your iPod from attackers. These include 'The gaffer tape method,' 'The Coke can method,' and 'The Christopher Walken method.'"

This links to the original story on CNET here:

http://crave.cnet.co.uk/digitalmusic/0,39029432,49 282165,00.htm

The introduction to this is incorrect based on the CNET story that is attributed. Here is why:

"CNET reports that the British Government today attributed the country's 22% rise in street crime..."

The article actually says:

The papers this morning would seem to agree with Cocker. "Rise in crime blamed on iPods", yells the front page of London's Metro. "Muggers targeting iPod users," says ITV. This is the reaction to the government's revelation that robberies across the UK have risen 8 per cent in the last year, from 90,747 to 98,204. The Home Secretary, John Reid, attributes this to the irresistible lure of "young people carrying expensive goods, such as mobile phones and MP3 players". A separate British Crime Survey, however, suggests robbery has risen by 22 per cent, to 311,000.

The tagline says:

"...CNET (Gamespot) journalist based in London, was mugged last week. The muggers held 'a semi-automatic weapon to the back of Cocker's head..."

The actual article says:

"...Crave, was mugged ten minutes away from the CNET offices here in central London. His assailants held what _felt like_ a semi-automatic weapon to the back of Cocker's head..."

[Note: emphasis is mine]

The introductory blurb attributes a percentage to the wrong group and states it as if it were fact. The introductory blurb statues that a semi-automatic weapon was used in Central London?! This is _not_ a common occurrence in London. So uncommon in fact I highly doubt this claim.

"Cocker told us, "I chased them -- two of them threw me against a wall and took everything. It's lucky I didn't have my usual stash of gadgets on me -- my iPod, my Archos AV500 or my laptop. Mugging in London is out of control. I had my Motorola L6 grabbed right out of my hand".

He _chased_ them. Two guys with a "semi-automatic" weapon. Wow! That does not seem like the smartest move. And, it just seems odd. Would you chase someone if they had a semi-automatic weapon? In addition, he didn't even have an iPod on him, but the whole thing implies this starts because his iPod was stolen!

This is a clear-cut example of how information gets massively and quickly distorted in the media. To the author, please resubmit your introductory blurb to clarify this story. Thank you.

If you want to read a story that does actually question whether the Apple launch was overhyped, check this bitter attack on the Apple launch by CNET, which claims that, "Jobs' announcement of a new leather case for the iPod was especially ridiculous. Like the queen announcing a new toaster in Buckingham Palace."

The sucker punch here may be the transfer software -- there is none. Samsung has wisely avoided the self-destructive policy of companies like Sony, which uses a proprietary transfer software hot from the depths of hell. Samsung's new player is drag-and-drop, which means it works just like an external hard disk -- making the YP-Z5 completely platform independent.

this is all I could find. Hope its true...