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http://consumerist.com/2010/01/new-coke-bottles-made-from-sugar-cane-soda-still-made-from-corn.html

I remember reading in the consumerist that an AT&T consumer representative said "the phone is not offered to you because New York is not ready for the iPhone." They (temporarily) stopped selling one of the best selling phones in the country's biggest market! Isn't this already an admission that their service sucks? I guess it could be interpreted as AT&T blaming the iPhone and New Yorkers instead of their own network, but I think we all saw through the rep's thinly veiled admission.

http://consumerist.com/2009/12/att-customer-service-new-york-city-is-not-ready-for-the-iphone.html

with the way oil prices are going, and how deep we have to dig now to get to oil, or how we have process things like shale and tar sands in order to get at it... and how great our advances so far in terms of genetics, biochemistry, materials science, and related processes, i confidently predict 100% of sources for plastics in the future will be from plant-based starting points

http://consumerist.com/2010/01/new-coke-bottles-made-from-sugar-cane-soda-still-made-from-corn.html

The problem with the Geek Squad is that Best Buy managers are often so far removed from what the Geek Squad is and how it should work that it becomes a poorly managed mess in many stores. This is the crux of the issues many people have with the Geek Squad.

Yep, once including Geek Squad's founder Robert Stephens who sold it to Best Buy and was able to stay:
http://consumerist.com/2007/03/geek-squad-city-insider-rebutts-founders-retort.html

Consumer Reports likes it.

http://consumerist.com/2010/01/consumer-reports-science-shows-magic-jack-is-actually-worthwhile.html

Friends don't let friends take their computers to Best Buy!

While true, the thrust of TFA is that friends don't let friends buy their computers from Best Buy.

If you follow consumerist, you'd know that Best Buy is all-around one of the worst companies in the world, right up there with AT&T, Comcast, and AIG. Best Buy is also famous for lying on the phone about their inventory, holding holiday orders hostage, not honoring extended warranties, overcharging for items they don't have and refusing to cancel the order, even entering your house without permission. And that's just in the last month.

More on-topic, it's becoming increasingly rare to go into a Best Buy and find a computer that hasn't been "optimized" with a nice little $20-$40 markup.

Friends don't let friends take their computers to Best Buy!

While true, the thrust of TFA is that friends don't let friends buy their computers from Best Buy.

If you follow consumerist, you'd know that Best Buy is all-around one of the worst companies in the world, right up there with AT&T, Comcast, and AIG. Best Buy is also famous for lying on the phone about their inventory, holding holiday orders hostage, not honoring extended warranties, overcharging for items they don't have and refusing to cancel the order, even entering your house without permission. And that's just in the last month.

More on-topic, it's becoming increasingly rare to go into a Best Buy and find a computer that hasn't been "optimized" with a nice little $20-$40 markup.

Friends don't let friends take their computers to Best Buy!

While true, the thrust of TFA is that friends don't let friends buy their computers from Best Buy.

If you follow consumerist, you'd know that Best Buy is all-around one of the worst companies in the world, right up there with AT&T, Comcast, and AIG. Best Buy is also famous for lying on the phone about their inventory, holding holiday orders hostage, not honoring extended warranties, overcharging for items they don't have and refusing to cancel the order, even entering your house without permission. And that's just in the last month.

More on-topic, it's becoming increasingly rare to go into a Best Buy and find a computer that hasn't been "optimized" with a nice little $20-$40 markup.

Friends don't let friends take their computers to Best Buy!

While true, the thrust of TFA is that friends don't let friends buy their computers from Best Buy.

If you follow consumerist, you'd know that Best Buy is all-around one of the worst companies in the world, right up there with AT&T, Comcast, and AIG. Best Buy is also famous for lying on the phone about their inventory, holding holiday orders hostage, not honoring extended warranties, overcharging for items they don't have and refusing to cancel the order, even entering your house without permission. And that's just in the last month.

More on-topic, it's becoming increasingly rare to go into a Best Buy and find a computer that hasn't been "optimized" with a nice little $20-$40 markup.

Friends don't let friends take their computers to Best Buy!

While true, the thrust of TFA is that friends don't let friends buy their computers from Best Buy.

If you follow consumerist, you'd know that Best Buy is all-around one of the worst companies in the world, right up there with AT&T, Comcast, and AIG. Best Buy is also famous for lying on the phone about their inventory, holding holiday orders hostage, not honoring extended warranties, overcharging for items they don't have and refusing to cancel the order, even entering your house without permission. And that's just in the last month.

More on-topic, it's becoming increasingly rare to go into a Best Buy and find a computer that hasn't been "optimized" with a nice little $20-$40 markup.

Friends don't let friends take their computers to Best Buy!

While true, the thrust of TFA is that friends don't let friends buy their computers from Best Buy.

If you follow consumerist, you'd know that Best Buy is all-around one of the worst companies in the world, right up there with AT&T, Comcast, and AIG. Best Buy is also famous for lying on the phone about their inventory, holding holiday orders hostage, not honoring extended warranties, overcharging for items they don't have and refusing to cancel the order, even entering your house without permission. And that's just in the last month.

More on-topic, it's becoming increasingly rare to go into a Best Buy and find a computer that hasn't been "optimized" with a nice little $20-$40 markup.

Yep, that was another mess altogether. I once did a lot of research, particularly on the Consumerist on that mess.
From http://consumerist.com/2007/03/geek-squad-city-insider-rebutts-founders-retort.html :
"our tipster contends that Robert is too far away from the action inside Geek Squad City to really know what's going on there. ..."
Ouch, sounds like a common problem.
From an interview:
"FSB: If you could go back to before becoming part of Best Buy and give yourself one piece of advice, what would it be?..."

Yep, that was another mess altogether. I once did a lot of research, particularly on the Consumerist on that mess.
From http://consumerist.com/2007/03/geek-squad-city-insider-rebutts-founders-retort.html :
"our tipster contends that Robert is too far away from the action inside Geek Squad City to really know what's going on there. ..."
Ouch, sounds like a common problem.
From an interview:
"FSB: If you could go back to before becoming part of Best Buy and give yourself one piece of advice, what would it be?..."

I'm not calling a working XBOX 360 lame. I'm calling a 54.2% failure rate and no plans to revamp the hardware lame.

The app store is getting full of this junk: fifty dollar "apps" that give you credit in some ridiculous game. And worse. The "social" aspect is focused on trying to hook your friends and acquaintances in; it's not MMO, it's Amway.

Mafia Wars CEO Brags About Scamming Users From Day One and Scamville: The Social Gaming Ecosystem Of Hell are good starting points, if you haven't seen this before (or realized it as obvious).

"Lassez-faire is not an ultimate truth. If it were, then we would have private police, unregulated tobacco, and the supermarket could sell you anything that looked like meat without any regulations at all. That is a recipe for a crime and public health disaster." even libertarians like me believe in a govt police force to protect the rights of others and have the basic framework of govt.. Who is going to shop at a supermarket that sold bad meat if the public is properly informed? The age of the internet only spells more reason for less government regulation and more dependence on the natural forces of free market economics, not less. Remember AOL? Liberals loved Vincent Ferrari but unfortunately for them, he is a prime example of the internet enhancing the power of free market economics. http://consumerist.com/2006/06/the-best-thing-we-have-ever-posted-reader-tries-to-cancel-aol.html

Yeah, the blurb says the guy did erase it. The investigators found it in a "deep" scan. Which means they just used a block editor.

FWIW, there are loads of ways you could have this happen to you. Like this for instance I recall a story where a church bought a new computer and it was full of porn too, but I can't find the story.

BTW, posting as AC to tell my story. This happened to me once and I wasn't even looking for porn. I've had two downloads through bittorrent that weren't what they claimed to be. One was a cd full of kiddie stuff claiming to be an engineering application. Terrified me! I deleted it and used bcwipe about a dozen times.

"This firm represents Microsoft blah blah blah you're violating our rights.

Specifically, at this site you are providing information directing users how to misuse the Microsoft Bing Cashback program through unauthorized technical means. Further, on this website you admit that you have personally misused the Cashback program in this regard. Microsoft believes that your actions and the direction that you are providing to others regarding this method of misuse violates various laws relating to computer intrusion, unauthorized access and unauthorized use of information. For example...directing users how to misuse the Cashback program constitutes a knowing and unpermitted access of data in order to wrongfully obtain money and is also unpermitted assistance in providing a means of accessing a computer, system, or network in violation of California Penal Code S502(c)*. This conduct would also violate provisions of the federal Computer Fraud and Abuse Act, Fraud and Related Activity in Connection With Access Devices, and common law principles under state law.

Microsoft views the misuse of its programs...cease and decist...blah blah...."

Looks like they're taking cues from Best Buy.

* CALIFORNIA PENAL CODE 502(c) "COMPREHENSIVE COMPUTER DATA ACCESS AND FRAUD ACT"
(1) Knowingly accesses and without permission alters, damages, deletes, destroys, or otherwise uses any data, computer, computer system, or computer network in order to either (A) devise or execute any scheme or artifice to defraud, deceive, or extort, or (B) wrongfully control or obtain money, property, or data.

Hmm, so Microsoft isn't trying to wrongfully control or obtain money? Last I checked, the class-action against Best-Buy was approved. Posting a blog post is tantamount to being an elite hacker who broke into a network and stole trade secrets or money?

Er, is this a serious post? You do realize that the link leads to a thumbnail, don't you?

Remove the -thumb part of the URL, and you get something more readable. Still a pretty lousy scan, but perfectly legible.

Er, is this a serious post? You do realize that the link leads to a thumbnail, don't you?

Remove the -thumb part of the URL, and you get something more readable. Still a pretty lousy scan, but perfectly legible.

No it's not, you do it like this.

you forgot all contacts entered into this phone are open to our marketing department. all photos taken can be used by the carrier for advertisements. all calls made will be recored to insure "quality" control

I know you're joking, but that seems to be happening with T-Mobile. People logging in to their accounts are seeing other people's pictures (including nudie shots) in ads for other T-Mobile services:

http://consumerist.com/5397214/t+mobile-surprise-porn-not-an-isolated-incident

Is it no surprise that among those 600,000 users banned (nearly 4% of their users!) that there was some collateral damage?

One user, who reported having spent over $5200 on the xbox and XBLA, wrote to Consumerist that Microsoft banned his fiancé's unmodded console, and then treated them like criminals when they tried to get Microsoft to fix the problem:

http://consumerist.com/5402056/xbox-gamer-says-he-was-banned-online-for-no-reason

Linked from there is a story from another user whose xbox suffered a fan-induced RROD. Not wanting to wait nearly a Month for Microsoft to fix it, he took it to the shop to have the fan replaced, apparently tripping some sort of modification flag. Microsoft's response to him? Literally (and I quote) "But this is what you get for tampering the console." (sic).

What a disaster.

This guy says he didn't

http://consumerist.com/5402056/xbox-gamer-says-he-was-banned-online-for-no-reason

Even worse, Comcast will be charging you an Early Termination Fee. http://consumerist.com/5243872/comcast-lowers-your-bill-then-charges-early-termination-fee

I also can't believe that Comcast is getting away with this. The days of 'early AOL' are upon us once again, except that instead of busy signals, we're getting modem disconnects. It's like the DSL ads poking fun at "web hogs" are going to be true.

Throttling, caps, and higher prices. Ugh.

I'd rather they eliminate the caps and just serve a 6mbit/1mbit pipe, unmetered. They know that most people aren't going to use 6mbit sustained 24/7. Then they could actually spend some time adding backhaul capacity. A genius idea!

I'm glad Verizon FIOS is still cap-free and doesn't throttle anything. :|

http://consumerist.com/5393720/3-cellphone-apps-to-block-texting-while-driving I think the better long-term solution is to have sensors built in the car that triangulate the phone's position in space, and locks out certain phone functions if it determines the driver is trying to use the phone. It checks the data against the speed of the car and the weight on all the seats, so the passenger could still use a phone, for example. But of course, you could always put a big chunk of lead on the passenger seat and then lean over and reach to that side of the car to send a text message...which doesn't sound very safe either...

Except that the license is not legally binding. How can it be? You don't get the license until after you purchase the product. You never sign the license AND if you don't agree to the license, they won't let you return opened software. Sounds pretty one sided to me. Judges don't typically look kindly on people who try to force one sided contracts on the masses. Just see this ruling from a judge in Washington regarding AT&T's arbitration clause.

No, because Aquafina, a Pepsi product, is actually just tap water run through a filter and bottled.. and sold for an exorbitant price..

See the following link http://consumerist.com/5392454/misplaced-letter-costs-pepsico-126-billion-in-bottled-water-lawsuit

I remember the big issue back in february covered on consumerist: http://consumerist.com/5157481/ about facebook refusing to delete people's profiles. Just how long do they intend to retain someone's data?

Anyone who quotes propaganda as their main source for information is probably out of touch with reality.

Translation: presented facts that don't match your storyline are ignored. Do honestly thing that Micheal Moore isn't ready for his right wing critics? Do you honestly thing that with the planet-sized corruption in the Bush Administration, the health insurance industry, and Wall Street that he can't find material to work with that stands up to scrutiny?

Insurer denies caner treatment because patient "failed" to disclose that she had acne.
Blue Cross denies payment for severe miscarrage by calling it an "elective abortion".
CIGNA denied a liver transplant as being "experimental" despite liver transplants being around for 45 years.

And so on. And so on. And so on. And so on.

Phantom, you're crossing the line between willful ignorance and malicious incompetence.

Why redact the headhunter and headhunting firm's name from your story? If the facts are true it seems they should stand on their own merits. I say spill their name and let it serve as a warning to all. Even better, submit your story with all of the relevant facts to The Consumerist.

i pay the $15 per year for 600mb. it's fast, it works well on imap, i can use aliases, and my email won't trigger behavior profiling, won't target ads, or freeze me out of my email because someone sent me a spreadsheet.

i know everyone is used to paying for email, but i really like email without ads, someone that will support mail from a domain i own, from a server i don't have to manage but can access anywhere with anything. i think they provide a great service for what i pay for.

The problem with your suggestion is that Monsanto has made a habit of lobbying http://consumerist.com/363935/ regulatory agencies to prohibit food items from carrying labels that effectively certify the item as coming from Monsanto-free sources or production methods.

When producers of non-GMO products are prohibited from labeling their product as-such so that I can choose which I want to buy, then *YES* there is something stopping me from paying for the non-GMO product.

What Monsanto has repeatedly done is (analogously) argue that Kosher food must never be labeled as Kosher because it is nutritionally equivalent to non-Kosher food and "Kosher" labels on some products would cause harm to producers who do not choose to certify their products as Kosher.

http://consumerist.com/5035528/jobs-confirms-iphone-kill-switch

Jobs himself confirmed the capability is in the iphone. I don't know if they've used it, but they can.

If you can stand the mental torment, the pay taking cancellation calls at Sprint call centers starts about about 45k a year and tops out at 80 to 90k if you are good and do 20 to 30 hours of overtime a week. Before the scam was exposed 3 years* ago AOL call centers taking "retention" calls pay also started at about 50k and topped out over 100K for those willing to do heavy amounts of overtime.

* http://consumerist.com/191878/timewarner-dissolves-aol-retention-centers

http://sprint.jobsincallcenters.com/

"According to the print edition of Game Informer, 5,000 surveyed people said the XBox 360 fails over half the time. The same survey found failure rates of 10.6% for Sony's PS3 and 6.8% on Nintendo's Wii. Microsoft trounced the competition with over five times the next highest failure rate. The article also notes that the survey revealed a skew to the numbers as the Xbox's were the most used consoles: 'Results said 40.3 percent of 360 owners use the console three to five hours a day, compared to 37 percent of PS3 owners. Meanwhile, the plurality of Wii owners (41.4 percent) play their consoles less than an hour a day.' Even worse news for Microsoft is that only 3.8% said they would buy another Xbox (due to failures) and the survey found they had rather shoddy customer service."

So it should be noted that a potential skew is that from the surveyed five thousand, Xbox users play their console more than Wii or PS3 users. While this certainly wouldn't explain the skewed percentages, it indicates the consoles are in higher use causing potentially more wear and tear.

But yeah, bad indicator for Microsoft and this new information actually caused me to wait to buy an Xbox 360 at the new reduced price. I think the 3.8% figure of repeat business is a good indicator that a lot of people agree.

Off-topic musing: It's interesting this Game Informer dead tree article has such virtual world implications yet the original source chose for it to be only released in their print edition and not on their site. Has GI always done this? An indication of things to come or a death knell for its readership?

A reader survey conducted recently suggests that the failure rate for the PS3 is far lower than that of the Xbox 360, though higher than that of the Wii. PC wasn't included.

Source: http://consumerist.com/5338852/xbox-360-failure-rate-is-542-percent-game-informer-finds

Yeah, homebrew, if your 360 isn't one of the 54% of 360s that have broken, with a long repair turnaround and substandard customer service.

(yes, I am aware that the survey isn't very robust, but still...)

to take this 68-point checklist with you of all the things that have a good chance of being wrong with your new Camaro, and check them all before you take possession from the dealer.

I mean seriously, isn't the Camaro supposed to be the showcase of GM? If things are bad enough that a group of Camaro fans create this list, what does that say about GM's statements that they've improved quality in the past few years?

Some places only want techs that can upsell extended warranty and other carp and cut the hours of the people who don't rip people off.

Just look at how bad places like staples are http://consumerist.com/5048382/why-i-quit-staples-easy-tech, http://consumerist.com/362708/staples-tries-to-charge-senior-citizen-390-for-basic-computer-repair

That is what you get when you rank people by how they sell and have boss who have little to no idea about how tech works.

At small non chin place that I am at this person ones came in and there laptop did not work and it was fixed by just resetting the ram and he only had to pay $10.

Some places only want techs that can upsell extended warranty and other carp and cut the hours of the people who don't rip people off.

Just look at how bad places like staples are http://consumerist.com/5048382/why-i-quit-staples-easy-tech, http://consumerist.com/362708/staples-tries-to-charge-senior-citizen-390-for-basic-computer-repair

That is what you get when you rank people by how they sell and have boss who have little to no idea about how tech works.

At small non chin place that I am at this person ones came in and there laptop did not work and it was fixed by just resetting the ram and he only had to pay $10.

Exclusivity arrangements promote competition and innovation in device development and design. We work closely with our vendors to develop new and exciting devices that will attract customers. When we procure exclusive handsets from our vendors we typically buy hundreds of thousands or even millions of each device. Otherwise manufacturers may be reluctant to make the investments of time, money and production capacity to support a particular device

Really? Because T-Mobile, even though they don't have an iPhone offered still supports it. (see http://consumerist.com/5243325/t+mobile-provides-iphone-support-despite-not-offering-iphone for a reference).

Exclusivity arrangements do not provide competition, competition should be done with -gasp- the networks. Lets see, AT&T is pretty expensive, but they have a decent 3G network, T-Mobile is a bit cheaper, but their 3G is lacking outside of major cities. Verizon is CDMA and so is Sprint and I'm not a fan of CDMA phones so I doubt I will ever use them. That is how competition is supposed to work. Not -insert major phone maker here- just announced a new phone exclusive to -insert network here- so you buy the plan to get the phone. Thats not how its supposed to work at all.

Well, I mean the prevailing attitudes like this.

Of course, for individual consumer the debate is academic, since there is no way they can try to prosecute a user copying music from one device to another (how are they going to find out?), but regardless of the precedents, the attitude of those in power are not friendly towards activities like that. Their first inclination is to claim as much "right" as possible, and our first inclination is to err on the side of caution.

I'm afraid you're wrong, sir or madam.

I am one of the victims of this programming error, and I can tell you that several thousand VISA debit transactions were miscoded with the same amount: $23,148,855,308,184,500.00.

I was not smart enough to look at my card number before I sent it off to Consumerist so that VISA could be made fun of. Happily, the string does not contain my (or apparently anybody's) credit (or debit) card number.

Actually, I think it is more like 95% of the time So it's not so bad after all.

Don't know why but it reminds me of this SNL Skit: Don't Buy Stuff You Can't Afford
http://consumerist.com/consumer/clips/snl-skit-dont-buy-stuff-you-cant-afford-252491.php

It seems hardware manufacturers have a hard time learning that electronics cause heat and that this heat needs to be led away from the device.

Fixed that for you.

It has nothing to do with Apple - all hardware manufacturers seem to have problems. A quick look at google for "laptop battery catches fire" turns up this story about a Dell battery catching fire, this story about an IBM catching fire, and this story about a Toshiba catching fire. And we know those three stories aren't rare - those were just quick search results to prove a point.

If you're going to pick on a manufacturer for a faulty battery issue, make sure you don't portray it to be something unique to that manufacturer when it's actually something that occurs pretty much across the board.

It's a nice read on the various things to think about in the design of software. But we still seem huge amounts of production code that is in error or even insecure. These are abstract concepts about design, but the problems in production are real and concrete. There is a failed connection between them. For example, how is it that the computer system for Frontier Airlines has only a place for ONE person to be designated to pick up an unaccompanied minor?

If you don't trust it on a remote host, it probably shouldn't be web accessible.

With the the way many ToS's are worded I find it a rather sensible thing to not trust remote hosts. Remember this?" and there are plenty more examples like that around.

I can't help but wonder where did all of the douchebags come from.

It's simple statistics. In any large group of people, and on the internet we're talking billions, even if most people are wonderful it is a statistical certainty that a small fraction will be douchebags. Those douchebags have visibility out of all proportion to their numbers. e.g. The 4 people who were responsible for 3 billion robocalls.

In addition, in the real world it's usually obvious when you're dealing with an possibly unsocialized child. On the net, not so much.

---

The USA is <5% of the world's population. It is statistically insignificant.