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What's in Your Gadget Bag, Cory?
Cory Doctorow has taken a two-second break from his road warrior ways to pen this description of the crud he lugs around. Read it and weep, wanna-bes.
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They also asked CmdrTaco the same question recently.
What's in Your Gadget Bag, Cory?
filed under gadgets
Cory Doctorow is the Nerd Prince of Blogging: co-editor of the popular BoingBoing.net, acclaimed science fiction author, and advocate for the Electronic Frontier Foundation. A man this busy needs as much helps as he can get, and Cory isn't shy about what gadgets he finds useful (or awful):
Fido Vtech prepaid mobile: this is the worst mobile phone I've ever owned. I have a bottom-of-the-line Nokia I use in Europe and a similar one that T-Mobile sold me in San Fran, and when I turned up in Toronto last week, I figured I'd just put a prepaid SIM into that one and go with it. However, the scumbags at T-Mobile *locked* the fucking thing, which meant that I had to go buy *another* phone (that's THREE phones in total, now!) and I ended up buying the Vtech used for 60 Canadian pesos at a counter in a Chinatown mall. It receives and sends SMS, but it doesn't have T9, so it's basically impossible to use for texting. The UI is utterly martian, like something designed by throwing dice, and the phone itself feels like it's made out of dried spittle and chewed-up paper. Worst. Ringtones. Evar. Oh, and it's FUCKING LOCKED to Fido. Rilly. Christ.
Exilim EX-S3: This is the BEST camera I've ever owned. The 2MP version of this thing was the first camera I ever owned whose UI made perfect sense to me, the first one small enough to carry around in my pocket all the time. The 3MP version is every bit as slick (and now I'm lusting after the 4MP version with the fast mechanical zoom lens), but higher rez. My only complaint is that you can't charge it off of USB -- I try to charge all my devices off of USB from my laptop using ZipLinq retractable cables: saves on shlepping around a bunch of bricks and is a total lifesaver in Europe, where I need only adapt my laptop to the local plugs. The only downside of this thing: it is so GODDAMNED COOL that it's impossible to just whip it out and fire off a couple casual shots: someone will always come up and ask to fondle it and get their DNA all over it.
iPod 40GB: I've taken to using this to store video as well as audio: I have about 30GB of music and audiobooks, and the remaining 10GB makes for enough storage for several DVDs' worth of ripped movies that I can watch on the road when I tether the iPod to my PowerBook. (Indispensable iPod accessory: iSkinz rubber casing; friggin' iPods scratch if you look at 'em crosseyed).
15" PowerBook G4 1GHz/80GB: Bought an Aluminum Book last September (I usually kill about one PowerBook/year) and am still loving it. The weight is a little bit much -- I've been a 12" iBook and PowerBook user for 3 years or so, and the extra pounds really add up -- but the screen real-estate and that high, high RAM ceiling, c'est magnifique.
Linksys WAP-11 and WS824: I'm trading this rig for the office I borrowed for the month of April. I think that the FCC made Linksys take the 824s off the market cos they put out dirty, lobe-y WiFi at distance, but this building's got a stucco facade whose chickenwire guts act as a natural Faraday cage, so it's not like my signal's interfering with anyone else. Probably.
Roadwired RAPS laptop case: I love this vecro-y computer diaper. It's wicking, padded, and sizes to fit any laptop (though the 15" PB is a tight squeeze). Much nicer than any sleeve for my money.
RoadWired Ethernet cable: hands-down the best retractable Cat5 cable I've ever owned, and the RJ45-RJ11 adapters that hide in the case turn it into a phone wire for those craptacular 56K moments.
BohemianBag.com Czech Plumber's Bag: The perfect-sized, durable leather shoulder bag. Looks like $106, and keeps on getting prettier the more I abuse it. Steel-reinforced handle is super-swell. I replaced the shoulder-strap with a RoadWired cushion strap for extra comfort between departure gates.
TokyoFlash OVO DecisionMaker watch: this is the dumbest and coolest watch I've ever owned (my grandfather was a watchmaker, so I've owned quite a few). It has a built-in f
"Is that a gadet in your pocket, or are u just happy to see me?"
what a geek....oh wait.
The Kruger Dunning explains most post on
It seems to me that a number of these functions could be easily combined into one useful "sub-tablet" much like the Newton used to be. For instance:
.mp3's off their old Newtons.
1) I could not make phone calls on the Newton, but it seems to me that combining a WAP with code like iChat could easily be patched into a cellular network via a server which negotiates the call at perhaps a reduced price. VOIP, right? This way you don't have to worry about "locked" phones when you travel from one country to another or good around with those SIM cards. (where did I put that SIM card anyway? *as he digs furiously through his travel bag*)
2) I am not sure why folks like using their phones as cameras, but Sony has been integrating cameras into their Clie's for some time now and could easily be done. Although, again.....I am not sure why people want this. The CCDs would have to get LOTS better and you still have to deal with tiny lenses with lots of aberration in them. I much prefer my Canon Elph.
3) iPod. Well, yeah....music and why not movies too? This functionality could easily be emulated on any OS and as I recall, there are many folks that even play
4) Well, the Newton was not a replacement for a full featured laptop, so if you want to do Photoshoppin or something like that, a sub-notebook will not cut it for screen real estate alone.
5) Cables? What cables? Use 802.11x and Bluetooth. Done.
6) Time? Apple for some time has had servers that are linked to atomic clocks so that you can set the time on your computer to an absolute time.
7) PDA? This would be an uber PDA. We don't need no stinkin Palm.
Shoot, there were people that were even using their Newtons as wireless web servers, so the functionality was there.
So, there. Seven devices that folks are totin around that could be all one device. I hate to say it but why does not Apple get back into this market? They could do it right.
Visit Jonesblog and say hello.
An Electronic Thumb
The Guide
Last, but not least, a towel
A feeling of having made the same mistake before: Deja Foobar
Is there anybody anywhere in North America selling a GSM phone that isn't locked to a provider? You'd think that true road warriors would want to either chip-swap or have multiple chips and enough brains to suggest which network to make a call on, or could be told by the user which one to use in software...
Darn! My Swatch has seen better days, so I was really excited about the "OVO DecisionMaker Watch":
I relish the impracticality of a watch that makes you sit through a 10-second animation before showing you the time, and which periodically goes into "naughty mode" where it distorts the time so that you can't read it until you give it a "corrective shake" that's hard enough to trip the built-in motion-sensor.
Well, the link from Cory "who the heck is this guy?" Doctorow's page was 404, so I googled around a bit and found out the bad news: they're sold out and can't get anymore. "Previously sold at Tokyoflash. Sorry, we can't get any more." Crap!
Time to add another saved search on eBay...
Stressed? Me? Of course not. Stress is what a rubber band feels before it breaks, silly.
Apparently his kit doesn't contain a host capable of withstanding the first 5 minutes of /.'ing. Still loading.
Hope he's got a spare webserver in that bag because they're going to need a new one.
I didn't see "a girlfriend" in that list...
The coolest voice ever.
The first sentance of the article you didn't read is...
Cory Doctorow is the Nerd Prince of Blogging: co-editor of the popular BoingBoing.net, acclaimed science fiction author, and advocate for the Electronic Frontier Foundation.
He's a tech writer and a pretty good tech pundit. He makes frequent appearances on TechTV's The Screen Savers.
"Hey! Youve got too PowerBoocks! Ha! Dupe!"
The Kruger Dunning explains most post on
"60 Canadian pesos"
That's good shit.. We can insult both of our neighbors in one shot.
Already there are a number of posts where people say "dude, you could replace 12 items with a single XXXX piece of gear"
I challenge these people to a usability test. Can a camera phone do justice to a 3 MP camera? PRobably not. Does it make sense to put an MP3 player in a phone or pda, if you are limited to 256 MB of music? NO! Is it comfortable to walk down the street taking pictures and listening to music on your laptop? That's a recipe for breaking your laptop.
It seems like Cory has the "convenience first, hard-core gear later" ethos down pat (heck, he even plans for those times when you have to use dial up! Egads!) First line is a camera that fits EASILY in a pocket (I love my Canon Powershot, but I need pants with roomy pockets!) and a phone, iPod in another, working our way down to a PDA and ultimately a laptop. His statement where he uses the laptop to recharge everything makes it sound even more like its his "base- station away from home" and less like an on-the-go device.
I mean, I could hook up my Visor Neo to my Cingular phone and ssh, but why when I have broadband at home, broadband at work, and don't travel? (did I just lose my membership in the Geek/Nerds Unified Technology Society by admitting that?)
In the future, I would want to not be isolated from my friends in the Space Station.
...one of the things he does NOT carry around is bandwidth.
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Mod me down with all of your hatred and your journey towards the dark side will be complete!
i don't understand what's to be upset about. he has normal geek stuff that most /.'ers own. I probably make way less than him, but I have a laptop, bag, digital camera, wireless router, and cell phone. and while i've yet to buy the ipod, i have had multitools and pda's in the past. i clicked the link expected crazy stuff. there's no gps. no plasma tv's. no rackmount servers. its cool to see what's in his bag and cmdr taco's but ... its not like i should 'read and weep.'
I always have a couple of nice pens on me, my TI-89 for the off chance I need to find the tax on an item, or a mugger demands all my money unless I can do a really tricky trig integral. An extra set of headphones in case an impromptu lan party were to spring up. My green laser to point and laugh at the people with the lesser red lasers. On my hand is my LAKS 256mb watch, filled with all sorts of neat stuff. I also carry a big package of mints in a Dilbert tin, for both my breath and others. And, finally in my pants pocket, the most versitle and usefull tool of them all, a wallet with cash and plastic.
This guy needs to check his priorities. He has all that crap with him just in case... but what if he gets laid?
Lets face it... nerds dont get that many chances... so we should all cary condoms at all times. It would be terrible to have the chance of a lifetime and not be prepared. They are much cheaper than child support and antibiotics.
Obama is a twitter sock puppet
So, here's some information about what I carry in my "kits":
In my pockets:
In my computer bag, which I carry 90% of the time I go anywhere. My computer bag is an Eagle Creek small shoulder bag with upgraded padded shoulder strap that includes a sticky ruberized side to reduce sliping off your shoulder.
Finally, I periodically have another larger bag which I carry in my car for our weekly Hacking Society or other geek meetings. It has a pile of stuff in it:
I'm a 3rd party Dell on-site tech. It comes in handy to have lots-o-stuff on the road. Here's my list of crap-in-a-car.
...that's the stuff in the front passenger seat, I won't even start on my trunk....
-Dell 400 CPI-A w/802.11b wifi pcmcia(loaded with Winamp 2.8 and a case full of MP3 CD's and a cassette adapter to play over the car stereo) in Dell's leather multi-pocketed breifcase type laptop case.
-Xircom 10-100 +56k PCMCIA nic (in pocket of case w/several boot disks) just in case
-Handy-dandy Knoppix 3.3 CD
-Kodak 3.2 MegaPixel cam
-1 Silver Jam Cam 3.0
-1 Blue Jam Cam 3.0 (you can never have too many sh*tty camera's)
-USB cable to transfer from camera's(in case Bigfoot's in a mood to pose). (No SD's or MMC's available)
-Palm Viix (in case on my belt)
-Palm Portable keyboard
-Sony Ericson t306 cel phone (on holster on my belt) w/ear bud
-Palm size Multimeter
-Lysol. (some people are pigs and so is there home (great grammar?!?!...I think I got my point across, though))
Some people are like slinkys. They're useless, but it puts a smile on your face to push them down the stairs.
I never owned a laptop, or a palm pilot. I certainly will never own a cell phone. I'd like a digital camera but never got around to researching which one to buy. Anyway, film works just fine for me still. Basically all I got is occasional use of my wife's iPod.
Does this make me less of a person in the eyes of /.?
-Lebofsky
You only need two things. Duct tape and WD-40. If it moves and it shouldn't, use the duct tape. If it doesn't move and it should, use the WD-40.
Well, it's gonna sound retarded, but there is a point here. It's great to condense equipment completely, but there's really a point in which equipment doesn't need to be condensed.
;)
For example, the iPod fits the perfect niche of being a personal media playback device and a storage device at the same time. Adding video to this device would be a bit of a hack, and quite inconvenient considering the UI that the iPod uses. So why not just build wireless into the thing and have it talk to a Newton-like device (Bluetooth of course, but we all know it's dead..
Next, I believe that Cameras go really well with Cellphones, but I don't believe they go well with PDA's. Reason: a cellphone is used for convenience of location, you can make a call from anywhere. Having a picture functionality built into that call is also awesome, because if I'm picking out a car from a lot, I can send pictures back to my mom of the things she wants to look at (color, price, etc), and have her call me back with what she thinks. Rolling this functionality into a PDA seems too clunky; overkill.
I also don't believe for functionality's sake that PDA's and Cellphones work well together, so I'd like to keep those seperate. The reason for this: you can't jot down a note or look on a calender while having a call without really straining yourself.
This being said: there are new camera phones built in with Bluetooth as well.. (see where I'm going yet?) Imagine having the circle completed with a tablet-PC like device, with a 4 inch LCD screen, a CD(-RW possibly? DVD-RW even?) drive to read in videos, movies, games, to use on the tablet pc. Use the iPod as the harddrive. Use WiFi where applicable, use the cellphone when not. Pictures from the cell can go directly to the iPod and be stored, or to a flash card reader (or dongle) on the PDA device. You set up a nice, Three way triangle of useful features, each vertex completed by the other two devices, but QUITE functional without them.
While it'd be nice to have them all in once device, it's just not at all possible these days it seems. While everything's a lot smaller, these smaller devices cost a lot more than most anyone would pay for. To roll ALL of the features above into one, you'd might as well buy a laptop. To roll in the features into the devices I've mentioned... well, all they'd really need to do is develop the PDA/Tablet-PC end, and roll Bluetooth/WiFi into the iPod, which, IMHO, will probably be the next revision.
Dreams maybe, but could be the very near future..
"Victory means exit strategy, and it's important for the President to explain to us what the exit strategy is." G.W.Bush
I goto war, err work and school, with just a couple of multi-purpose gadgets:
1. A t-mobile sidekick. Sure it has some duct-tape helping keep the screen in place but it does all my email and its an excellent browser. It also has AIM and an ssh client. I leave the computer at home where it belongs. No more lugging around a laptop and hurting my back.
2. Neuros MP3 player/recorder. The thing transmits to FM so I don't need any damn cables. It has a 20gig drive in case I need to move data and don't want to burn a CD. (it also records line/in and has a built in mic. It also tunes FM)
3. A small case of CDs. Lots of utils and knoppix when things get serious.
4. A 128 meg USB drive. Contains (among other things) putty, tightvnc viewer so I access my windows machine, lots of school docs, some work stuff, etc.
5. Watch? I don't need no stinkin' watches. (there's one on the phone)
I wouldn't SSH over GPRS. Too much latency. GPRS works for web, email and IRC (the latter just good enough) but SSH overhead brings GPRS to its knees. Don't even think about playing games over GPRS.
Knowledge is power. Knowledge shared is power multiplied.
T-Mobile will allow their phones to be unlocked after about three months of service. Just send email to simunlock@t-mobile.com with your name, phone number and IMEI number and they'll hook you up.
the growth in cynicism and rebellion has not been without cause
Author keeps bitching about Tmobile and Fido cause the phones he bought from them are locked... Could you European folks just please check out the facts before you call these companies "scumbags" (from the article, about Fido).
The fact is that both Canadian and American phone companies have to fund phones to make them cheaper for consumers so they can get 'em at decent prices. Vtech phones may be shit, but you paid CDN $60, while it woulda cost you about US $200 to get it in Europe unlocked. So buy your crap and don't complain.
All right. I know I am not the only one here who thinks this: I'm so tired of the phrase "Road Warrior." I like and respect Cory Doctorow, but he is not a "Road Warrior." Neither are those wanna-be geeks who go out to sell technology instead of do technology.
Until I see some souped-up buggies with frickin' lasers, I don't want to hear about road warriors. I hate that phrase more than I hate iSomething, or eOtherthing. Hell, I even hate it more than I hate "My Foo." All that was clever the first time, cold pancakes with no syrup the second time, and absolutely grating the third time.
Frickin' lasers. Until then, zip it.
Microsoft is to software what Budweiser is to beer.
At the risk of turning this into a geek's version of penile-measuring, here's mine:
* 20GB ipod (3G). Currently working through the entire LOTR audiobook set.
* Griffin iTrip radio adapter... great, unless you live in Boston where there are NO unused radio frequencies.
* Sony lightweight clip-over earphones. I need bigger ear canals or something.. Can't handle earbuds. Good sound, but did they really need to make the wire between left and right sides 2' long?
* Nokia 3650 w/ bluetooth earpiece. This phone also doubles as my PDA, synced via bluetooth to either Outlook or Evolution through gnome-bluetooth. Camera is decent for close-up shots, but colors always seem too saturated.
* Dell Latitude C840. One heavy mofo of a laptop, but my eyes are grateful for the huge screen. Trumobile (802.11g) inside as well, running fc1.
I've got more than that in my left hip pocket alone!
Of course, the 15" Powerbook chafes a bit, but...
I have a girlfriend whose name doesn't end in
Wasn't there a multi-tool which allows one to change the tools on it? If not, there out to be, or someone should make a small multi-tool which is certified for air travel. A Leatherman Micra sans knife blade (replace it w/ a nail file?) would be about right.
Failing that, buy a spare multi-tool and snap the knife blade off (terrible to do but...) --- last I checked the FAA regulations small eyeglass tool kits were okay, if pliers are as well, should work --- be sure to check the latest iteration of the FAA regs before travelling though.
For my part, the only time I didn't have my Leatherman w/ me was when travelling to Hawai'i last year --- normally I also keep a camera toolkit in a small leather ``Safety tool kit case'' which Levenger's was selling a few years back (way cool and highly recommended, has small wrenches and hex keys in addition to the normal screw drivers) but left that behind 'cause of the awl in it and since it goes beyond the afore-mentioned ``glasses repair kit''.
William
Sphinx of black quartz, judge my vow.
A computer. ...what, you were expecting a whole bevy of singing and tapdancing gerbils?
Honorary Member of Jackie Chan's Kung Fu Process Servers
Cory forgot to mention his enormous, throbbing ego, which he carries around with him all the time.
I saw Cory speak at a conference last year. He got a legitimate, well-reasoned, nicely worded question from the crowd. Because it didn't agree with his world-view, Cory belittled the guy and didn't address the questioner's point at all.
All Cory is about is promoting Cory. Remember a few months ago when he got press for being on the Atkins diet? Cory would get into necrophilia if he thought there was an upcoming "Necrophiliac Geek Trends" article in Wired that he might get mentioned in.
- "When you want something with all your heart, the entire universe conspires to give it to you" -Paulo Coelho
I roomed with Cory for a little bit, and I'll tell you right now, with that many geeks around, the mains outlet real estate becomes quite valuable. (I think I had no less than 10 items that needed recharging and Cory, even with USB chargers, must have had way more than I.) So it was a first-come-first-serve battle for recharging.
Kinda like an Oklahoma style land grab for power outlets.
Thankfully, he carries a mini surge protector that at least gives you a few more places to plug in.
Since I've seen him do that, I've taken to carrying one in my bag when travellling, and it makes a big difference. Hotels never have enough outlets.
And I guess a multiple outlet surge protector really isn't a "gadget" per se, but everything else in the bag can be made useless quite quickly without it...
______
Once: you're a philosopher. Twice: a pervert.
It's times like this when I recall the old TV show "Connections" by James Burke. He said he liked to challenge people to empty their pockets or purse and try to find one object that wasn't mass-produced. Keys, coins, paper, pens, money, etc, it's all mass produced. I've tried this on dozens of people, and only one person had a single non-manufactured object, my sister had a fossilized shark's tooth she carried as a lucky charm. Everybody carries around nothing but manufactured crap. It's all instantly replaceable garbage, nothing of any intrinsic value. If you were stripped naked, you could replace all of it without difficulty, if you had some cash to buy new crap. Is that how you want to live, with a disposable lifestyle? Even worse, do you want to live a craphound lifestyle, reveling in consumerist crap like Cory does?
> Is that how you want to live, with a disposable lifestyle?
Wait, so the only "real" "non-consumerist" you found was a credulous superstitious person who carries a lucky charm? Yeah, believing in fantasy, what a wondeful saving grace. Maybe next time you'll find someone with an "real piece of the original cross."
> Is that how you want to live, with a disposable lifestyle?
Nothing like an english speaking westerner with a computer and an internet connection telling us to go back to the woods. Its called hypocrisy. You happen to be using a large "disposable consumerist gadget" yourself.
>If you were stripped naked, you could replace all of it without difficulty, if you had some cash to buy new crap.
So if there was a fire in my apartment its good to know I can get back to my business, my lifestyle, etc with minimal effort. Heck, these evil "consumerist goods" are compatible with my off-site backups! Comrade you have truly awakened me!
>Even worse, do you want to live a craphound lifestyle, reveling in consumerist crap like Cory does?
Craphounds look for junk with no resale value like a clock found in the garbage that has a 1950's pinup girl painted on it. (its called ironic appreciation) Going to the local thriftsore or garbage-bin to collect 'crap' is the polar opposite of consumerism.
> speaking as a multilingual buddhist
Yeah, its fairly obvious you're some religious view.
>Filling your pockets with crap will not reduce the emptiness in your life.
What emptiness? Don't try to be play "everyone's shrink." Thanks.
Now, if I pull out a USB drive from my pocket and it has all my writings on it and my art then guess what - it is exquisitely unique. But from the ignorate macro level, to you, its just another gadget.
If I pull out a mass-produced camera full of data which when rendered are photos of all my loved ones then its unqiue and important to me. But to you, its just an consumerist addiction and I'm a gadget buying fool.
I seriously suggest you stop and think about what you're complaining about and realize that good things come in "Evil consumerist packages."
Finally, little grasshopper, what if my USB keychain had a photo of a cool shark's tooth I saw on the beach, but didn't want to take for my own moral reasons. I would think that someone who did that would be much more respectful of nature than your (as you define it) "craphound" sister.
To paraphrase: the first rule of The Accidental Tourist is to never travel with anything that isn't easily replaceable. If you take the opinion that you can never be sure what'll happen to you, even on a walk to the corner store, then you should never carry anything irreplaceable, ever. (And it would seem to me that someone who needs a lucky charm at all times would certainly agree with such an opinion.)
The problem is, ID cards and whatnot are actually a pain in the ass to replace. So you have people carrying photocopies of their birth certificates. What we need next is either implanted marks of the beast (so we don't have to worry about loosing them) or proxies for the things that are hard to replace like the Universal Card.
I myself also have a problem in that I'm just in this part of the world for school and, despite having been here for almost 6 years, never got around to feeling like a permanent resident. So since I am "travelling" as far as I'm concerned, I try to avoid owning irreplaceable things at all.
If you have $4K worth of equipment on you and you walk into a shady neighborhood, you are asking for serious trouble. If you have very good insurance or you're an affluent geek, then this should be a non-issue. For the budget-conscious / paranoid geek, it is a big deal. If you're heading off to a country where crime rates are high, you might consider leaving your precious gear at home.
Here are a few ideas that could save your valuable gear and data.
1. When stepping out of your secure environment (hotel, office whatever) empty your pockets and wallet. Carry enough cash to get around and back comfortably, but leave credit cards, important papers and other stuff at home. If your "lucky charm" is a $2.5K De Beers diamond pendant, leave it home. Trust me, you'll feel lucky. Take off that tacky Rolex as well.
2. All the data you need to carry can be stored in CD-Rs. If you're going on an installation / demonstration, you'll definitely get a computer on site. Live CDs help too. Alternatively, have all the necessary data on your website. If security is an issue, use encryption. I think most places have computers these days, so no use carrying your own.
3. Long travel time? Get a paperback. Losing a $5 paperback vs. $250 ipod - do the math. I've noticed that it can be hard finishing a paperback in a busy 1 week road trip because too many things come up. Besides, I don't see why anyone needs to have their lifetime's music collection with them in a trip.
4. Digital camera - what's wrong with film? Scanned film from an Olympus Stylus Epic (~$85) can beat the quality of any $800 digital camera. Batteries go for a long time, and you won't worry about cables, chargers, NiMH batteries and memory space. You can buy film and batteries in most places.
5. Phone - Any cheap-o GSM phone will do. Just buy a "SIM card" from a local provider. Skip SMS and stick with email. Internet cafes can be found in most areas. I'm assuming you'd be heading out of the USA, so finding GSM would be easy.
In summary, travel light, keep gadget count to a minimum, and ensure the safety of your precious gear and data. If you're facing the wrong end of a gun, losing a paperback, few CD-Rs, and $200 worth of gear is an experience you can live with. $4K? That would hurt.
Of course, if you are a high profile geek who *needs* to have $4K worth of gear wherever you go, you could probably afford a bodyguard in hostile environments.
C.E.
because no matter which crowd I'm in front of when I start pawing around and pulling stuff out, it almost never fails to produce a "WTF is THAT!?!?" from whichever crowd, geek or musician, I happen to be around at the moment :-D. (Sadly, haven't ran across any fellow-geek, linux-using blues players around my area, hope I'm not _that_ rare a breed :-/ )
Progressivism (aka US 'Liberalism'): Ideas so good they need a police/surveillance-state to enforce.
Reporter: So, Mr. Einstein, what's in your gadget bag?
Einstein: Gad-get who?
Reporter: Gadget bag?
Einstein: Oh, a clickitty sack! No, I don't carry those. I used to have a compass, but I ruined that with the magnet.....I also used to have a motorcycle, but my licence got revoked for driving too fast. I explained to the officer that I was going under the speed limit, but he didn't understand....
Reporter: I see, how fast where you going?
Einstein: c
Reporter: see what?
Einstein: No, 299,792,458 m / s
Reporter: Could you convert that into miles per hour?
Einstein: No.
Reporter: Yeah, I was never good at math either. So, what gadgets... err I mean clickitty things do you carry around?
Einstein: Oh, just a pencil and paper.
Reporter: How about a watch?
Einstein: Ah, I find it irrelevent.
Reporter: I see. That's not too impressive. I hear even Von Neumann carries around a cell phone.
Einstein: Look, Johnny and I never got along... I don't mean to bad mouth the guy, but you think he'd invented a new fundamental law of physics or something. Oh and Godel tried to get me one of those pre-paid things... I never use it. I told him, I don't even wear socks, and when I do where socks they don't match. Oh, and I don't tie my shoe laces either. Mrs. Godel bought me some velcro shoes. They're nice.
What do you mean my sig is repetitive? What do you mean my sig is repetitive? What do you mean....
I've never heard of GSM phones that could not be unlocked. Maybe some really old phones, but on modern phones it's just a code in the software which can be changed, if you get the unlock code. Here (Denmark) the provide is obligated to remove the lock after six months (the maximum period they can require you to sign up for in exchange for discounts on the phone). And a lot of people simply buy a locked phone, have it unlocked (third party, on modern phones it can be done simply keying codes into it (just did it myself to a Nokia 3410)), and get a cheap service (since their new provider doesn't spend money subsidicing phones), and it is completely legal (you buy the phone, and of cause you pay the minimum monthly subscription to the original provider until you can cancel it).