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Slashback: Bits, Bytes, Words
Money changes everything. After numerous writeups about the hacking potential of their iOpener device, Netpliance changed their service model and even the design of the product itself. Sounds like that wasn't enough: Cy Guy writes: "Netpliance has announced that they are raising the price of the i-Opener from the introductory price of $99 to $399 (neither price reflects the $21.95/month cost of Netpliance's Internet service which must be used with the device.) In a c|net interview Netpliance president Kent Savage dismissed hacker modifications to the device as a factor in the price increase." As Ioldanach puts it, "Think its 'cause they finally realised it was cheaper to raise prices then 'hack-proof' their product?"
What I'd like to see is Netpliance package the LCD and CPU of the i-Opener and sell those packages to OEMs, so they could create custom housings, new uses, etc -- after all, lots of people would like a small LCD X-terminal.
MacGuyver, The A-Team, NASA ... Grave writes: "Looks like NASA got DS1 functioning again. A probe that was almost entirely made up of experimental technologies can be salvaged, yet two hopefully-soon-to-be-routine flights to Mars can't be. Ah, well, at least we know that Ion Engines are workable. Bring on the TIEs!"
TRUSTe dusts off the white hat for a bit? Last week, a story appeared which noted the alarming news that failed web-merchant Toysmart planned to sell its customer information in an effort to recover some money. According to this Standard story, "The nonprofit organization TRUSTe announced Friday it is planning to file a brief in bankruptcy court that will decide whether Toysmart.com can sell its customer lists." Jamie raises two points to consider:
- Time will tell what effect (if any) TRUSTe's planned brief will have on the Toysmart bankruptcy proceedings.
- The company that bought Boo.com insists they will continue to honor the old privacy policy for old customers.
Maybe we could combine this with 'Survivor'? jgalvin222 writes "APB Online, Inc. has filed for bankruptcy. This web site is known for offering in-depth breaking news, tons of information on ongoing investigations, and you can listen to live police scanners. This web site will surely be missed, and if you read the article, you can see that some of their techs have volunteered to post crime and safety articles over the next couple of weeks - without pay. If anything, you should peruse their video library, some of the clips are both amusing and interesting."
The Devil will find work for idle hands to do. Ryan writes: "Here is something to keep us Mac fans happy. Go2Mac reports that Diablo II has gone gold for Mac version, making this one of the quickest PC to Mac conversions ever." Here is the official announcement from Blizzard.
For the last time, Netpliance is a internet provider, not a hardware company!
I've seen many people expressing an opinion that Netpliance should manufacture "special" I-Openers for thin X-Window clients, etc. and tap into an emerging market. The problem is that Netpliance doesn't manufactuer the Iopener, and is losing money from every hardware sale.
What they really want to sell is the internet service; the hardware is purely secondary. I believe Quanta is the sub-contractor for the Iopener, these are the people you should approach for hardware.
ok here's the deal with the price going back up, i used to work for tech support so i had billions of these questions when they first dropped the price. The original price of the iopener was $399 in November of 99, then they dropped the price to $299 for the X-mas holidays. Then they had a Super bowl comercial that advertised a $199 so the price dropped again, they started selling so they dropped the price to $99 around late feb to try to flood the market before the other i-appliances got in. After Fathers day the pric whent back up to 299, and i guess now there is a such a demand for the POS that they are going back to the orig 399 sticker price, they are still loosing mony on it since its about 600 to make. Oh yea by the way, i tallked to a few of the hardware guys over there before i quit, seems that they are starting to think there are some seriour hardware design defects with thte modem, go figure, about 80% of my calls were i can't connect Issues.
The raising of the price was in their plans all along, even before people started hacking on them. They were lost money selling the actual hardware and made money on the internet service. After the initial publicity push with the $99 dollar, and realising that they weren't turning the profits they liked, raising the price was necessary. The hardware hackers were just an extra annoyance.
-- demiurge
You find a file that appears important and obliterate it from memory!!!
Score one for the downtrodden hacker!
Linux needs to gain more coverage and aquire more games. This will increase the userbase, hardware coverage, and make many of us who use Linux now much more happy having games for Linux.
People fight and say the companies will still make games for Windows because they know Linux users will dualboot.. While this is true, don't you think that us Linux users would BUY MORE games if they were ALL for Linux?
Just some food for thought.. heh.
Who's the black private dick, who's a sex machine for all the chicks?
If only I could play Diablo II on my iMac... Unfortunately, my revision A iMac suffers from the infamous "Green Light Of Death" syndrome (GLOD). Moderators, yes, this is an off-topic rant, but I'm trying to help and warn others.
GLOD is due to problems with the analog video board (inside the monitor part of the iMac enclosure) that can make it impossible to switch monitor resolutions, use the monitor energy saver, or to reboot the iMac without unplugging it. In severe cases, it can make the computer unusable. A search for GLOD on the iMac discussion board in Apple's Tech Exchange uncovers dozens of posts in the past 60 days alone, yet somehow Apple Tech Support denies all knowledge of the problem.
If it was just me, it would have been a random hardware failure, and my tough luck since I'm off warranty. With the volume of complaints about it (and the articles on MacFixit), it's obvious it's a design flaw. It apparently also affects some of their monitors and other models of iMacs. I'm currently getting the run-around and the usual denials from Apple Customer Service. Either they're totally ignorant and don't read their discussion boards, or they're in denial mode so they don't have to recall a million iMacs...
Apple used to build really solid hardware. I've seen 128K Macs (the originals!) survive over 16 years. It's sad that my iMac has suffered two hardware problems in 16 months.
The moral of the story? Always buy the extended warranty if you have to buy a Mac... At least I can gut my iMac and turn it into a nice LinuxPPC box...
-YADMU (Yet Another Disgruntled Mac User).