Slashdot Mirror

http://cgi.ebay.co.uk/cheap-bike-for-sale_W0QQitem Z280008083270QQihZ018QQcat#ebayphotohosting

Ohh, you said Blackhole...

both sellers had 99% approval and hundreds of sells, both times, the product was broken although the description said it was 'like new'

eBay is a fucking shithole, and more and more people are falling in every day.

http://feedback.ebay.co.uk/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewFe edback&userid=amir6626&items=-1&item=6825578528&de =off

And if I was getting something that big, it'd be more like one of these

lol, I have used the same facts a few times so far but I write them from scratch.

I was discussing the MS/eBay issue with some of my pro-MS friends and even their reaction was "oh no, that's the end of eBay".

We imagined Clippy coming along with "Hello, seems like your hard drive has bad clusters, would you like to Buy a New One"

yup yup yup. I currently use keywords for google, google images, traceroute, whois, ebay, wiki, xe.net, php.net, mysql.com (though their website is mostly useless (in comparision with the brilliantly useful php.net)), amazon, archive.org, a file extension search page, and ip2country. yay for bookmarks! your suggestions welcome.

FYI:
http://www.dnsstuff.com/tools/tracert.ch?ip=%25s
http://filext.com/detaillist.php?extdetail=%25s&Su bmit3=Go!
http://whois.webhosting.info/%25s
http://web.archive.org/archive_request_ng?collecti on=web&url=%25s
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Special:Search?search =%25s
http://www.xe.com/ucc/convert.cgi?Amount=%25s&From =USD&To=GBP
http://www.ezwhois.net/index.php
http://search.ebay.co.uk/search/search.dll?satitle =%25s&ht=1&sokeywordredirect=&from=R8&fkr=1&soloct og=9
http://www.php.net/search.php
http://www.mysql.com/search/?q=%25s&charset=
http://puremango.co.uk/ip2country.php?ip=%25s
http://www.amazon.co.uk/exec/obidos/search-handle- form/026-9212734-6757257

take a look for these :

BEHRINGER ADA8000 (eg : http://cgi.ebay.co.uk/BEHRINGER-ADA8000_W0QQitemZ7 410403504QQcategoryZ23792QQssPageNameZWDVWQQrdZ1QQ cmdZViewItem )

a soundcard with an ADAT interface (dont know any makes / models)

some audio editing software - cubase, pro logic (not sure if cool wave will be sufficient)

boom. quality raw audio to be mixed / processed in software

found this device which actually does kind off what you want using skype http://cgi.ebay.co.uk/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&it em=9717093504

I've bought a few of those as presents but they all died after about 3 months.

I don't know what they did with them but they all lost their mp3 playing ability, though you could use them for a while as 1gb keychains.

I got them all from Hong Kong via ebay for about 40Eu

http://search.ebay.com/1gb-mp3

http://search.ebay.co.uk/1gb-mp3

got one right here.
a usb device that can be used to control stuff on a pc, yup. ;-)
seriously tho - most of these things come with extra buttons that you can re-program with the bundled software to control winamp/wmp/itunes whatever. I guess someone could write some drivers for linux to pickup the extra signals and translate them.

Now, Buy It Now is overtaking the auction feature and dealers are holding sway.

Speaking as an eBay seller, it seems that eBay wants it to be this way -- at least for small items -- and I'm not happy. I, for one, would prefer to use the classic bid option to sell my photographs but with the way eBay nickel and dimes you to death, it's just too costly by the time I'm done with gallerly fees, category fees, initial price fees, final price fees and paypal fees. I'm hoping the ebay killer comes along soon so I can switch ships.

-CGP

... which is fortunate as nothing enjoyable is completely safe. It's Illegal It's Immoral Or It Makes You Fat

I don't quite get what google base is. From reading the FAQ this is part of google's plan to organize all the worlds information -- but sometime we need a bit more structure than that. I sell my photos on ebay and would love to be able to use a different service as payments to ebay are death by 1,000 cuts. But, are people really going to look for photos of London in the same place they'd try and find recipes and free web hosting?

Will this do?

http://cgi.ebay.co.uk/POKIA-retro-mobile-phone-han dsfree-PHOBILE-cool-gadget_W0QQitemZ9105970823QQca tegoryZ42427QQrdZ1QQcmdZViewItem

Or just look elsewhere on eBay for more normal (ahem) old phones.

> And why do I have to get some used POS when all I want is a telephone I can take
> with me?

Stuff that would cost thousands of pounds are pratically given away thanks to mass production. The downside is when stuff goes out of fashion you have to make do with the new stuff. Overall, it works in the consumer's favour (the manufacturers don't do too badly either).

> The largest nationwide network (Cingular/ATT) actually stopped supporting
> older phones a while back, anyway.

Older phone = those old AM radios? I think we're spoiled in the UK for coverage (and phones) compared to outside the EU.

> Can't you damned kids just get a laptop for better email, music, and game
> playing - and maybe a camera for taking better pictures? :)

I don't want my laptop stolen so I'd never use it on the train/bus etc. I have a dedicated MP3 player I always carry for music (though my phone has a radio and mp3 player, but the storage is a relatively small 32megs or so). I have a nice 4mp camera which I take for `proper` pictures, but it's nice to have a 2MP camera on me (on my phone) at all times for when I don't have my main camera with me (not often - doesn't exactly fit in my pocket). Perhaps a car accident, suprise meet-up with friends etc? (It does video too)

> I want a phone that turns on in less than 10 minutes

Never turn mine off!

> and has a display that doesn't run the battery down in seconds

http://www.cnet.com.au/mobilephones/phones/0,39026 174,40054424,00.htm
Nokia rates the N70's 970mAh Lithium Ion battery as being good for up to 3.5 hours talk time and up to 11 days standby. In our testing we averaged around 7 days inbetween recharges with a moderate level of usage, although that's a figure that could vary quite widely depending on how much use you made of battery sapping features such as Bluetooth.

11 days doesn't sound too bad to me.

> hint: it just takes 10 alphanumeric chars to dislay a phone number

UK phone numbers are (practically) all 11 digits long, and more for international numbers or if you're dialling an extension.

>16-bit backlit full color display

16bit? Keep up!

> But using a voice communication device to compose textual communication?

I've never done that - it does sound rather amusing; a little like taking a break from a long drive by stopping off at a service station and playing Sega Rally 2.

Enjoy your...hello?

Hello?

You need a new phone, mate!

someone was quick they got them on ebay as the 2Ghz Edition.

http://cgi.ebay.co.uk/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&it em=8766405196

Anyone know where i can get one as cheap as what he's getting them. I'm a student and can't aford the wack price.

Otherwise i welcome the upgrade I get the 1.8Ghz version for the price of the 1.6??? Got to Be good! :D I don't mind waiting a little longer get them them as long as there making it right?

You're killing me here! You don't know how to use Google or Gamespot???

Lazy bugger. Here's the link:
http://www.gamespot.com/pc/strategy/actofwardirect action/download.html?sid=6116389

It's 684MB.

I would agree that 30 Euros does sound high at this point. I looked at eBay UK and found quite a few copies for less than half that though, one as low as £7.99, supposedly unused. Might be worth a look.

eBay link for the lazy bugger:
http://search.ebay.co.uk//search/search.dll?from=R 40&satitle=act+of+war

Enjoy.. :)

Every auction I've won on Evilbay in the past 6 months has turned out to be a fraud. Evilbay would appear to be further tempting fate by promoting itself to the mentally challenged members of society. Evilbay has long partnered with well known IT vendor SUN Microsystems and now their UK division has partnered for a charity auction with low-brow British tabloid "The Sun". Britain's most popular tabloid is a condescending right-wing pictorial rag, gazed at by people of disturbingly low intelligence. There was also an XMAS TV spot which, being devoid of content, also shamelessly targetted potential fraudsters and victims.

Evilbay deserving winner of the 2005 Icarus award.

Every auction I've won on Evilbay in the past 6 months has turned out to be a fraud. Evilbay would appear to be further tempting fate by promoting itself to the mentally challenged members of society. Evilbay has long partnered with well known IT vendor SUN Microsystems and now their UK division has partnered for a charity auction with low-brow British tabloid "The Sun". Britain's most popular tabloid is a condescending right-wing pictorial rag, gazed at by people of disturbingly low intelligence. There was also an XMAS TV spot which, being devoid of content, also shamelessly targetted potential fraudsters and victims.

Evilbay winner of the 2005 Icarus award.

Exactly, this story completely undermines the entire argument that the patent system somehow benefits small inventors--it doesn't.

SURE, this guy won in the end... AFTER 25 YEARS. How many countless other inventors have simply given up? Would this guy have been able to also patent new ideas or defend other contested patents during this time period?

I'm not sure what he "won". And this just reinforces the patent theory that the person with the most money wins all patent disagreements.

First, being that 8-tracks were introduced into cars in 1966 and not in home units until a year later, there was already a desire and some innovation in the portable music market at the time. This guy made is first walkman like thing in the late '60s to early '70s. To me, there is not too much of a difference between a self contained modular radio and tape player that works off of a battery in a car and plays on slightly larger speakers vs a more portable personal unit. Headphones already existed, the form factor was pretty much there, the media was there, and batteries were there.

I know this is anti-slashdot-groupthink, because this is a little guy who was "wronged" by the big guy and the system, but this is about some guy who was probably getting high, listening to music with his friends, and said, "Dude, it would be cool to be able to walk down the road outside and listen to music". The article does not mention that he ever made anything or had a prototype, but rather had an idea that he was unable to sell to a series of companies. He filed a patent, and got a TV job, and then went after a Japanese company that marked _and_ made the best portable models at a reasonable price. Sony started putting these out in '79, I got my first "walkman" that was GE I believe in '81, and it sucked compared to Sony models, but was cheaper.

Sony was the name in portable media playback and recording. They have always been big in the video and audio market, especially with enthusiasts and professionals. Look here for a late 70s cassette recorder http://cgi.ebay.co.uk/Sony-TC-153SD-pro-portable-c assette-recorder_W0QQitemZ7568330640QQcategoryZ211 45QQcmdZViewItem Look here for the Sony timeline of electronics http://www.sony.ca/sonyca/about_chronology.shtml For those that don't know, Sony portable cassette recorders and then DATs were the defacto standard for concert recordings for years because of their quality in terms of being rugged and fidelity. I can't tell you how many Grateful Dead recordings I have that were recorded on a Sony cassette recorder or a Sony DAT.

Personally, I don't think this guy deserves a dime for sitting at home thinking of a portable music player, any more than I should get paid for sitting here thinking of traveling of the speed of light or living on the Moon or Mars.

Patents basically mean nothing. If you don't make anything from your patent, you just suck and are inhibiting innovation and the proliferation of the idea into reality. If you do make something and have a patent on it, again you suck because you expect royalties from companies that are being competitive in terms of price for a known item that should be a commodity instead of a monopolized product See this url, http://www.symbol.com/products/barcode_scanners/ba rcode_handheld_ls_4000.html for a good example. Symbol has a patent for bar code readers _with a trigger_. Simply because they patented the obvious, you, me, and every business has to pay an inflated price to read UPC labels on products that are not easily brought up to the counter or for inventory purposes.

To me, intellectual property is no more property than talking shit when drunk or stoned. This guy had the "intellectual property" but could not "sell" it to anybody, nor did he manufacture, market, and sell the product on his own.

Strange how the BBC is prepared to carry reports on fraud at Ebay, whilst at the same time its annual charity is likely to benefit from the sale of invisible Xmas trees delivered personally by Santa Claus at: http://cgi.ebay.co.uk/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&it em=4426980554

Saving a whole £20 or so compared with buying an extension tube set that will be rigid, lightproof, and non-shiny inside without all that fuss with Dremel and glue gun, and won't be full of salty crumbs.

Well, since you are not connecting the lens directly to the camera, any cheap 35mm camera lens will work.
Out of current Ebay-UK, take this cheap lens, which with the current going price will cost 3 pounds (about 5 euros/dollars) inc. p&p. Now your cost is slightly higher. Unless you buy a expensive DSLR, you can go even cheaper by getting something like a second hand Praktica MTL SLR which I personally have one and in the past bought a couple and handed to friends (because they are truly reliable and wonderful cameras) and the usual going rate is around 5-10 pounds plus p&p. Now that's cheap. Usually they come with a 50 or 58mm russian/east-european lens and they are good enough to be abused in any way.
Now, considering all these, trying one of these mods won't make you destitute. You can increase the bid by modding the camera to hold a CCD inside. Now that'd be a good project wouldn't it?

Well, since you are not connecting the lens directly to the camera, any cheap 35mm camera lens will work.
Out of current Ebay-UK, take this cheap lens, which with the current going price will cost 3 pounds (about 5 euros/dollars) inc. p&p. Now your cost is slightly higher. Unless you buy a expensive DSLR, you can go even cheaper by getting something like a second hand Praktica MTL SLR which I personally have one and in the past bought a couple and handed to friends (because they are truly reliable and wonderful cameras) and the usual going rate is around 5-10 pounds plus p&p. Now that's cheap. Usually they come with a 50 or 58mm russian/east-european lens and they are good enough to be abused in any way.
Now, considering all these, trying one of these mods won't make you destitute. You can increase the bid by modding the camera to hold a CCD inside. Now that'd be a good project wouldn't it?

But goto any of the European carrier's websites. Vodafone sells a locked Nokia 8800 phone for 280GBP ($490US). T-mobile sells a locked PDA phone (the MDA III) for $350Euro ($420US).

It's not exactly the best open market, but goto the UK version of ebay and do a completed item search for "mobile unlocked" and then sort by descending price. You'll see unlocked high-end phones like the Sony Ericsson P910i, the Nokia 8800, and even something as mundane as the Motorola RAZR V3 selling with a reasonably high number of bids for over 350GBP (over $600US).

_That_ is why we don't get some of the high-end phones and other countries do. More than a small number are actually willing to pay significant money for them. You'll never find a US carrier waste their time with the marketing, training, and inventory on a complicated, difficult-to-service phone that few will buy. Your shock is Exhibit #1 for the jury.

And no, I wasn't suggesting that we should pay higher for gasoline. I'm saying that the parent poster's concerns about a "phone/console gap" (with apologies to Dwight Eisenhower) are about as relevant as concerns about a "gasoline gap" or an "SUV gap". We're totally different markets with different priorities. Just as we might consider a mobile phone over $500US as excessive or wasteful, a European might shake his head over a soccer mom buying a Hummer to transport her kids to school.

It is also interesting to see the most popular web sites. Start by typing www. into google suggest. The top 10 are:

1. www.yahoo.com - Search/Directory
2. www.hotmail.com - Email
3. www.google.com - Search
4. www.ebay.com - Shopping
5. www.msn.com - Portal
6. www.aol.com - Portal
7. www.ebay.co.uk - Shopping
8. www.irs.gov - Government
9. www.mapquest.com - Maps
10. www.amazon.com - Shopping

Typing one more letter shows you the top sites for that letter. Here is the top for each letter:

• a is for www.aol.com - Portal
• b is for www.bbc.co.uk - News
• c is for www.cnn.com - News
• d is for www.dictionary.com - Reference
• e is for www.ebay.com - Shopping
• f is for www.food.gov.uk - Government
• g is for www.google.com - Search
• h is for www.hotmail.com - Email
• i is for www.irs.gov - Government
• j is for www.juno.com - Internet service provider
• k is for www.kbb.com - Consumer information
• l is for www.lyrics.com - Music
• m is for www.msn.com - Portal
• n is for www.nick.com - Kids
• o is for www.orbitz.com - Travel
• p is for www.pogo.com - Games
• q is for www.qvc.com - Shopping
• r is for www.rotten.com - Information
• s is for www.sears.com - Shopping (sorry slashdot)
• t is for www.target.com - Shopping
• u is for www.usps.com - Government
• v is for www.verizon.com - Telephone service
• w is for www.weather.com - Weather
• x is for www.xanga.com - Blogs
• y is for www.yahoo.com - Portal
• z is for www.zappos.com - Shopping

This is some random commentary to make sure that my post has enough characters per line on average to get by the lameness filter. Just a few more words should do it. Then I will be over the limit. Maybe you would like to hear a bit about my projects: Attesoro - A internationalization editor for Java programs. Coinmill - A currency conversion website with many currencies, and features such as abilty to parse English sentences asking for currency conversion. Java Utilities - Utilities for common task in the Java programming language such as parsing CSV files and string manipulation.

Pah, you think that's cool, there's a blank Apple Pro keyboard going for buttons on eBay right now. A genuine apple keyboard, just they obviously made a mistake. At first I thought it was a normal one sprayed, but it's not, just never had the character glyphs printed. Pretty neat. I'd get it, but it's going out of my price range, and I just bought a new mighty-mouse, so my new kit budget is 0. The auction can be found here Enjoy!

Fear the relevance...

Ads by Google
Cliche
Products and information about Cliche.
eBay.co.uk

"I buy groceries once a week...I fill up the front seat and floorboard of my car easily..."

Groceries:
http://cgi.ebay.co.uk/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&it em=6783518401
http://www.argos.co.uk/webapp/wcs/stores/servlet/S earch?storeId=10001&referredURL=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.a rgos.co.uk%2Fwebapp%2Fwcs%2Fstores%2Fservlet%2FSea rch%3FstoreId%3D10001&referrer=FG13P&searchTerms=2 852706&params=P6813
http://www.kayslifestyle.co.uk/psnlnet/product.asp x?sid=FMNJA95VFXLQBRN080FB0RF3561EW9J8&brand=KaysL S&prod_id=211251

You'll notice these are all UK sites, we already have an extensive rail network. It's common for people to shop with these.

"cold snowy climate like MN would have problems with a system like this..."

The Taxi2000 system shouldn't be affected much, the running surfaces are enclosed in the track. The UK ATS Ultra system would be affected by heavy snow. Depends on the implementation.

"Would be VERY difficult to evacuate with this system in such small cars."

You say that, but people use automobiles which aren't much bigger. A single Taxi2000 track is designed to take 7,200 vehicles per hour, 21,000 people/hour. It's the equivalent of a 3 lane highway. The performance limiting step with PRT systems is actually the stations, it takes 20-30 seconds to chose a destination and get into the vehicle (180 vehicles/hour/bay).

"All your records you need...family pictures."

You're kidding right. You're the one holding up traffic on the highway with the sofa strapped to the roof of your car?

"Elderly people and their walker/wheelchairs..."

The taxi2000 system is designed to accomodate wheelchairs.

"How would one of these function as an ambulance with all the equipment they need? Firetrucks? Police?"

It wouldn't but I'd expect police stations and hospitals to have stations built in.

"and if you have all these roads and vehicles still...what do you need the new 'transit' system for"

http://www.dot.wisconsin.gov/projects/d1/verona/im ages/congestion.jpg
http://www.portcult.com/DRIVING-emfhell26.jpg
http://www.fhwa.dot.gov/whoweare/img/traffic.jpg
http://www.dorsetcc.gov.uk/media/images/8/j/Ridgew ay2large.jpg
http://www.metrokc.gov/kcdot/news/photos/2002-2/09 3002corridor.jpg

Google has lots more.

Link to full Q&A (anon for not karma whoring)

There's always ebay
http://cgi.ebay.co.uk/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&ca tegory=42207&item=4386828334
http://cgi.ebay.co.uk/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&ca tegory=20524&item=4387196761

There's always ebay
http://cgi.ebay.co.uk/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&ca tegory=42207&item=4386828334
http://cgi.ebay.co.uk/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&ca tegory=20524&item=4387196761

Well, some enterprising American can stick them on ebay and available to the UK because they're upto $108 here.

As I speak one is going for $54.33:
http://cgi.ebay.co.uk/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&ca tegory=298&item=7520347783&rd=1&ssPageName=WDVW

I have a watch very much like the ThinkGeek one (have they stopped selling it?), and on it I have a copy of KeePass that will generate, store and encrypt your password list. This solution is great when you're working on a machine you know to be clean, but I wouldn't plug it into a cafe/library system.

Ebay And SUN

Powered By Solaris, the operating system the world trusts
Powered By Java, the world's preferred platform
Powered By Sun Systems running SPARC processors
Powered By Sun services and solutions
Sun helps to power eBay's Global Marketplace.

eBay has chosen Sun's Solaris Operating System and its suite of low-cost Solaris servers and Java software to help power the The World's Online Marketplace. If you're running a business like eBay's, or have similar aspirations, get some Sun.

but I'm curious as to how Solaris runs IIS 6.0, surely they don't have Windows for load balancing !

; telnet www.ebay.co.uk 80
Trying 66.135.192.78...
Connected to www.ebay.co.uk.
Escape character is '^]'.
HEAD / HTTP/1.1
host: www.ebay.co.uk

HTTP/1.1 200 OK
Server: Microsoft-IIS/5.0
Date: Mon, 09 May 2005 17:34:17 GMT
Connection: close
Server: WebSphere Application Server/4.0

http://cgi.ebay.co.uk/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&it em=4544414505
1980 AUSTIN ALLEGRO GREY £50.00 4h 41m

Ok guys ! 50 quids for a car 8)
Yu might even get some change back ...

Personal helicopters are already available and have been for some time -- with a good computerized guidance and hover control system, anyone with some lessons should be able to fly one.

Make a foolproof system and you'll just be faced with a better fool :) Old people will still drive ridiculously slowly and the kids will still drive around in their pimped up heli-mobile.

You can't teach old dogs new tricks. Or can you?

1GB 1G MP3 Player WMA/REC/USB/Built-in FM.

And no, I am in now way affiliated with the seller, just the first link after a search.

I bought one similar to this player (512 MB model) and It is pretty good. Personally I wont go for an IPod because I think it is big, mine has a good size and uses a AAA battery (I have 4 AAA rechargable batteries, so because I use it almost 7 hours a day...). And it is quite relaiable, and it gives me like 10 hours with 1 battery. (that is 2 days of use).

It also connects to the computer and all that.

The only downside I could think of, is the sound quality, but anyway, i bought a pair of Sony headphones and it sounds pretty well, I use 128kbps mp3 so as you can see I dont care a lot about the sound details, it sounds pretty well.

Oh, and also that "Built in FM radio", no I dont use radio so I really dont need it, and they could add some extra features.

Ones I use all the time:

http://ebay.co.uk/
http://news.bbc.co.uk/
http://b3ta.com/
http://slashdot.org/ :)

I'm a UKanian, so http://www.ebay.co.uk/ has a link at the top to http://pages.ebay.co.uk/ebay_SUN.html, saying they're Sun hardware and Solaris users.

http://www.ebay.com/ has an IBM logo in the sam place, which links to: http://pages.ebay.com/ebay_IBM.html. That's not Windows, as far as I understand (and will apologise if I'm wrong).

I'm a UKanian, so http://www.ebay.co.uk/ has a link at the top to http://pages.ebay.co.uk/ebay_SUN.html, saying they're Sun hardware and Solaris users.

http://www.ebay.com/ has an IBM logo in the sam place, which links to: http://pages.ebay.com/ebay_IBM.html. That's not Windows, as far as I understand (and will apologise if I'm wrong).

And lastly: if the business is so lucrative, why haven't any of the companies themselves decided to sell "special" accounts to people and cash in on the money?

http://cgi.ebay.co.uk/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&ca tegory=91359&item=7136392683&rd=1/

One thing I can say is good, though, is that eBay doesn't nail bidders for a fee as well. I've had to shell some $$ in the past on other auctions and thought that was pretty scurvy, but it actually is practice at many large auction houses. Sothebys and the like didn't become famous for their charity to buyers and sellers.

Yeah, but acccording to themselves (IIRC) EBay are not auctioneers:-

From Ebay.com and also at Ebay.co.uk, they say that:-

3. eBay is Only a Venue.

3.1 eBay is not an auctioneer. Although we are commonly referred to as an online auction web site it is important to realise that we are not a traditional auctioneer. Instead, the Site acts as a venue which allows registered users to offer, sell, and buy just about anything which is legal, at any time, from anywhere, in a variety of price formats. We do not review listings provided by users, we never possess the items offered through the Site and we are not involved in transactions between buyers and sellers.

In short, they do a lot less than Sothebys and friends, so I don't consider this largesse in any way.

here

I'm sure there must be some... they'll be in a backroom somewhere, stacked next to the perpetual motion machines and the random noise compression algorithms. :-)

Hey, mine's eight this year. It bootstrapped Gentoo in forty minutes and took six hours to build the rest of the system, including most of KDE, OpenOffice, mplayer and transcode. OpenOffice starts in a heartbeat, Konqueror flies and all whilst transcode is converting from Xvid to DVD at over 80 fps. Rock solid and totally responsive with a load average of 15.

It's fun to own a 14-way Sun E4000 :)

We'll discuss the power bill come summer, when I can't offset it against the savings on heating :)

Hit the nail on the head.

eBay is so pervasive in the auction sector, what with its continual name-dropping in feature films, music videos and so forth that it can pretty much charge what it likes and know it'll still be regarded as the de facto auction site.

Recently they made a stand about sellers enforcing a percentage rise for whenever a buyer paid using Paypal. Justifable really, since the seller loses out to the tune of ~3% otherwise.

Also, the concept of a Final Value Fee has no justification in my eyes. I can understand eBay charging a variable listing fee (depending on the item visibility & features), but to charge someone a variable percentage of whatever they sell their item for is absurd. Imagine selling a car via a local newspaper, and finding a representative at your door demanding a cut in addition to whatever they charged you to list the item in the first place!.. oh, and then finding your bank asking for their cut too for processing the money.

It wouldn't be so bad if they were a shining light in the customer service stakes, but their track record is atrocious. Not only are they notoriously slow at answering dispute resolution correspondance, but invariably they wash their hands of all but the most legally threatening (to them) issues. Feedback arbitration is practically non-existant, with malicious negative feedback being effectively permanent (even from members no longer registered and/or banned!).

As others have remarked - they will find some way to pass whatever costs they have to bear as a result of this CS initiative, whether it be to the buyer or seller (or both).

Matrox are moving more towards the business end of the market, rather than 3d and games. They produce a variety of multimonitor systems, like this.

Pretty impressive, IMHO.

Two seven ltr V8 petrol engines. Those soviets sure knew how to make an off- roader.

Here