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Why Netflix Is One of the Most Important Cloud Computing Companies
Brandon Butler writes "Netflix, yes the video rental company Netflix, is changing the cloud game. During the past two years the company has pulled back the curtains through its Netflix OSS program to provide a behind-the-scenes look into how it runs one of the largest deployments of Amazon Web Services cloud-based resources. In doing so, the company is creating tools that can be used by both entire business-size scale cloud deployments and even smaller test environments. The Simian Army, for example randomly kills off VMs or entire availability zones in Amazon's cloud to test fault tolerance, Asgard is a cloud resource dashboard and Lipstick on (Apache) Pig, is a data visualization tool for the Hadoop program; there are dozens of others that help deploy, manage and monitor the tens of thousands of VM instances the company company can be running at any single time. Netflix is also creating a cadre of developers who are experts in managing cloud deployments, and already its former employees are popping up at other companies to bring their expertise on how to run a large-scale cloud resources. Meanwhile, Netflix does this all in AWS's cloud, which raises some questions of how good of a job it's actually doing when it can be massively impacted by cloud outages, such as the one on Christmas Eve last year that brought down Netflix's services but, interestingly, not Amazon's own video streaming system, which is a competitor to the company."
While I watch Netflix, I sometimes think about all of the magic that must be going on behind the scenes to deal with varying delivery speed
In almost all cases, my video entertainment proceeds, uninterrupted
As a guy who has worked with video streaming at the lowest level, I have nothing but respect for their tech
It frustrates me that a company that relies so heavily on open source technologies on the server totally snubs users of those same open source technologies on the Desktop.
So you would have rather had no Netflix support in Android or ChromeOS? Because there would be no support at all without DRM. Such is the nature of the beast.
All so people can watch some of the worst entertainment in human history.
You know what? There's actually a bloody gigantic amount of excellent content on NetFlix. Admittedly their ultra-pathetic interface makes it damned near impossible to find, but it is there.
Now, there are reasons to dislike DRM, and in fact the stupid regional DRM licences are one of the reasons why people pay extra to access US NetFlix instead of their local one*, And surely there are still times each month when I'll grab something from Pirate Bay because NetFlix doesn't have it.
But, and this is the big fat critical but, at the end of the day NetFlix works, works well, and delivers a hell of a lot of good programming for very, very little money. And does so in way that the DRM is simply not noticeable.
It may be preferable for NetFlix to have no DRM, but as it stands now I can't think of any practical difference it would make to my experience as a user.
Until the anti-DRM crowd creates a fully Open Source media service, licences tens of thousands of TV shows and movies, and serves it up DRM free, NetFlix is the best that we've got.
*If you're stuck with NetFlix Canada, well accept that you've got one quarter of the choices, and half of those feature Paul Gross.
Three Squirrels
> How easily people forget that AWS is Amazon's excess server capacity.
Is this common knowledge? I've never heard this before. Do you have a source?
Ceci n'est pas un sig.
Yes. When you sign up for Netflix, you agree to their terms of service, that you will not copy their shit.
Instead of just suing people who break their terms of service (which is completely reasonable. If you don't want to abide by the terms, don't use the service), they cram unworkable DRM into open standards. Now we wind up with code running on our own devices that 1) we don't know what it's doing and 2) breaking it open to see what it's doing is a crime.
The NSA spying/backdoor bullshit should make it abundantly clear that non-libre software is a threat to human rights, and should be rejected, whether it's for movie streaming, "secure boot," cloud storage, or anything else. Fuck netflix right in their stupid faces.
We don't have a state-run media we have a media-run state.
You're not obligated to use it. If you don't want to use DRM, then don't. But if other people want to, that's their choice. That's what freedom is about. Don't try to shove your opinions down other peoples' throats. Just make your own choice, and let other people make their own choice.
He/she is most like an ex-AWS (like myself) employee. Only an employee of AWS could know such a thing to be true, or not.
I prefer to do it that way. I don't want to be bothered to have to pay bills every month. All I have to do is check in to make sure the appropriate amount is being charged. Is that so hard?
"Here Lies Philip J. Fry, named for his uncle, to carry on his spirit"
Instead of just suing people who break their terms of service (which is completely reasonable. If you don't want to abide by the terms, don't use the service), they cram unworkable DRM into open standards. Now we wind up with code running on our own devices that 1) we don't know what it's doing and 2) breaking it open to see what it's doing is a crime.
How can you say that with a straight face? If someone breaks their ToS, downloads thousands of videos and posts them online anonymously, how do you think Netflix will sue them?
If you don't want DRM on your phone, can't you just install a Cyanogenmod ROM that doesn't include the secret DRM bits?
If you use a debit card for this ( as my friend has to do for reasons not necessary to go into), you risk an overcharge on your account. If Netflix (or another company) charges you and does not deliver services, they already have your money and there is little you can do. And some companies (not NetFlix - yet, as far as I know), make it very difficult to turn this off once you turn it on - I personally know (via another friend) of one company that required you to send a registered letter to shut off auto charging.
Of course, you can check the TOS, but these can always change. My experience with changes in TOS is that you are notifed that there has been a change and then given a link to a 200 page PDF. Of course, you are not told where in the 200 pages the changes were made.
My point is, corporations do this because it tilts the game in their favor. It seems like a minor concession until you get screwed.
In my opinion, this practice should be made illegal. As soon as I save up enough money to bribe - I mean make campaign donations to - a few Congress-people, I'm going to get a law passed outlawing this practice.
The Media Source API that Netflix is helping to push also provides a lot of really useful features for non-drm video in the web browser as well. Providing a simple way to download chunks of video and seamlessly insert them into a container through javascript will prove really useful for javascript web applications. Even some of the encrypted stuff will be great for things like sharing personal videos with only a few friends.
As a web developer interested in new ways to provide video, the Media Source stuff would immediately be really useful to me, and I'm sure many other people who won't even touch the DRM part. Don't let one company sour the whole proposal.
I don't see the big deal with this, honestly. This is primarily a problem for individuals who have a problem managing their budgets. When they see $10 in their account and think it's OK to spend $10 despite prior commitments like Netflix, they need to keep better track of their money and where it's going. I say this as someone who frequently had this problem when I was just starting out.
I, too, prefer to simply pay bills rather than having it automatically deducted, but I won't raise a stink if it isn't an option. It's just so low on my radar that it's not worth the effort getting upset.
For the record, your friend should call her bank and arrange to have overdrafting disabled as it is never worth the fees involved. That system is your bank screwing you far more than Netflix ever can. Every bank can do this as far as I know. Then when Netflix tries to debit a card with insufficient funds, it will simply fail.
If you use a debit card for this ( as my friend has to do for reasons not necessary to go into), you risk an overcharge on your account.
This cannot be stressed enough. Never use a debit card online. In fact, just because you have a checking account that does not mean that you need a debit or ATM card, so don't even have one issued to you. When you open up that checking account, tell them "no."
If there comes a time that some fraudulent charges were made against your checking account, the set of plausible ways that it could have been accomplished have been greatly reduced in this manner. With checking accounts, you have to fight to get your money back, and its a whole lot easier if it was an ATM withdrawl but you've never had an ATM card issued.
"His name was James Damore."
There's a big difference between "you can choose to use DRM or not" and "DRM should be incorporated directly into an open-ended standard". The former is a perfectly reasonable position. The latter is just stupid. HTTP supports plugins and add-ons, so why should DRM be part of the HTML standard? It (Netflix DRM) was working just fine without being part of the standard.
Since you and Netflix sold yours and everyone else rights and freedom away for a few convenient shitty movies, we will now have to deal with the introduction of hardware locked "trusted computing" phones, and software that requires it. I will certainly never purchase another Android device ever again.
This was bound to happen eventually. It's not just Netflix, it's also Amazon, which has consistently refused to bring AIS to anything but a handful of Google TV devices. And it will be coming to Apple devices sooner or later. Enjoy your Ubuntu phone, I guess.
"You're right," Fisheye says. "I should have set it on 'whip' or 'chop.'"
How easily people forget that AWS is Amazon's excess server capacity.
Is this common knowledge? I've never heard this before. Do you have a source?
Vogels also noted that Amazon eats its own dog food. As of Nov. 10, 2010, all of the web traffic for Amazon.com is being served by Amazon Web Services, he said.[1]
[1] Miller, Rich. Amazon Cloud Now Stores 339 Billion Objects. Data Center Knowledge, June 22nd, 2011.
You might also like: to try using google before asking questions thus easily answered on slashdot.
"You're right," Fisheye says. "I should have set it on 'whip' or 'chop.'"
I've been a user of both services since they became available. Along with Amazon Unbox now becoming Amazon Instant Video and the even newer Amazon Instant Video with Prime, I humbly suggest that we consider that a large part of the Amazon Prime streaming library may actually be served to us by a white-label Netflix service.
Consider this: both Netflix and Amazon Prime Instant Video offer many of the same programming options with a few selections unavailable on one service or the other. Plus, there are many obscure series collections that appear on both services and at the same perceived video quality (at least, to my eyes).
The bulk of the live streaming library has to be shared, in my opinion, with Netflix. Business-wise, it makes sense. Logically, it makes even more sense.
Kriston
I still go to my local video store to rent movies or buy the DVDF/Bluray. I get commenataries, extra scenes and can watch it whenever I want. Eventually, Netflix deletes stuff from their libraries. What do we do with a movie we want to see again later? Some cloud services I do use, like Crunchyroll. But I much rather get the DVD set.
"SO we bide our time, waiting for a purer kick to bloom and the future is still bleak, uncertain and beautiful" -GSYBE
I like how you say the movies are shitty, as if you know what the poster (and other Netflix users) watch. Saying they're shitty is somehow supposed to enhance your position - to suggest that they're not worth it anyway to offset the DRM aspect.
Let's face it, hardware locked "trusted computing" phones and other hardware are the norm and getting worse no matter WHAT we do. We don't have the influence to tell every other person out there to not buy them - telling people to not enjoy life and modern technology over some ideological issues that really aren't that bad in the first place isn't going to work. Heck, as I get older I find myself less and less caring as well as more important things take priority in my life.
We can't stop locked hardware trends because the companies are too powerful. Fight battles that can be won.
What, pray-tell, do you honestly think YOU can do to make a difference? Spread the word? People don't CARE! The Internet seriously inflates how many people care about this issue, and in the end it doesn't matter anyway - the people at the top don't have any motivation to do anything differently because there's nothing to threaten them with. We have no power.
No, it's how someone who knows they have only one life to live acts. Not a loser - a smart person. Snowdon tried to do something about it, and now his life is completely and utterly fucked - asylum or not. He raised hell, and apart from some attention, nothing has happened of worth and history is a very strong indicator that nothing will happen in the future (as far as improving things is concerned)
I'm not saying it's right. I'm simply saying that it's EXTREMELY DANGEROUS to be a dreamer in a world like this. You can't fight them. So don't. Enjoy what we have and work around the problems as they come up. Might sound like giving up, but most people on other tech sites keep using Microsoft, Apple and Google technologies because honestly, you don't have anything to gain by not doing so.
So I can just hit the record button on my VCR and record it?
(Oh, right. It's digital, and HDCP protected. I suppose I could fire up the PS3 on its composite output, but meh: That's more downgrading than recording.)
So you mean I can do something like File -> Save As?
(Woops -- like that's going to be a thing that actually happens.)
The only reason that Netflix DRM is simply not noticeable is that we are already used to the concept that we needn't bother recording media for ourselves; we've already fallen down that particular slippery slope.
(Disclaimer: I like Netflix, and have been a subscriber for quite a few years.)
Kid-proof tablet..
I'm one of those individuals who have a problem managing my budget. I once spent $3 on an app for my Droid, which cascaded into $180 in bank fees because the account was overdrawn by a few cents by the time they tabulated everything since the bank (conveniently for them) does charges in such an order that it maximizes the fees instead of minimizing my pain.
I've also been badly burned by ill-timed Netflix charges.
The answer I found was not free, but it is very convenient and much cheaper than bouncing a bank account: A Wal-Mart pre-paid Visa card.
The card accepts direct deposits, does the usual free online bill-pay stuff, and lets me buy stuff online like Netflix.
Direct deposits are free. It costs $3 to load cash or a (printed) check into it at Wal-Mart. And it costs $3 per month if I'm under a certain threshold dollar amount for direct deposits in that month.
All those $3 fees might seem expensive, but Wal-Mart is open 24 hours a day and they're bloody everywhere: It's very convenient. My wife has a companion card that she can dump money into if things go south while I'm traveling, and the balance is shared (instantly) with my own card.
And when I'm out of money? It just doesn't work: Transaction Denied. And if it accidentally works and the account goes negative, all I owe them is the actual negative balance -- there are no overdraft fees.
My wife has a companion card with her name on it, and the same account number. If one of is is traveling, it's trivial to put money into it and it is accessible anywhere instantly, 24/7.
More recently, I just (earlier today) got a pre-paid card from Simple. Same basic concept as Wal-Mart, except without a physical presence, and with no meaningful fees to speak of. It takes direct deposits, and I can deposit checks/money orders by taking a picture of them and stuffing them into a drawer -- no travel required. (And free online bill pay and and and...)
It also lets me extract money from a few ATM machines near me without any fees at all, and they never charge fees of their own. (Cute.)
And, like the Wal-Mart card widget, there are no overdraft fees: The basic premise is that when you're out of money, it stops working -- and if it works anyway, then that's kind of their problem. Simple also has some good budgeting tools which I haven't yet explored because I haven't had a chance to put any money into it.
In any case, there are easy solutions for auto-billed services like Netflix and people who are lousy with money. These are two solutions, each with their own advantages and disadvantages, but there are many others like them.
(Simple appears to still be in the start-up phase of things. They're invite-only.
I requested an invitation on their web page got one fairly quickly, but now that I'm a card-carrying member I also have a handful of invites that I can distribute freely. AFAICT I do not get any sort of financial reward, or even a bloody cookie, for passing out invites. If anyone wants one, send me an email -- if nothing else, it's free to play with.)
(Also: Fuck banks. With interest rates being zero on most consumer checking accounts, the litany of unexpected fees that can result from a minor mistake, and their limited hours, there's little reason to continue using them for every-day transactions. I do still keep a bank account because they can issue a cashier's check, and will count my change and notarize my documents for free, but I keep only $10 in it.)
Kid-proof tablet..
Why shouldn't it be? Because you think it's yucky? Standards document what multiple vendors do, to help them do it the same way. That's all - they do not endorse, or make moral judgments.
Basically, successful standards usually take what vendors have working just fine without a standard and standardize it. Just making things up because they sound good and trying to impose them leads to fiascos like the previous HTML "standards", where half the endpoints didn't remotely comply.
Avoiding things that Xtifr finds yucky is unproven at best as a method for making a successful standard.
Socialism: a lie told by totalitarians and believed by fools.
It's prevalent urban legend (maybe it was true at the very beginning?) that AWS was created to make money off of spare capacity since they have so many servers they only need for the Christmas season. However, Amazon's load is actually fairly level year-round, and they make darn good money off of AWS.
Socialism: a lie told by totalitarians and believed by fools.
That's a clever solution.
BTW, with interest rates so low, banks are only really making money off of fees right now, which is why they're so focused on charging so many of them. The main reason most people have a checking account these days is to have a target for direct deposit - check cashing places are expensive and dangerous.
Socialism: a lie told by totalitarians and believed by fools.
bla, bla, evil corporations, etc....netflix makes it as easy as humanly possible to cancel or otherwise change your account. click, click, done.
Netflix is $8 a month. She really risks an overage over $8? Sounds like someone so poor, they shouldn't be buying Netflix. It's $8. That's the cost of one lunch. Put $8 into a savings account for backup. haha. Or, just use Paypal for your Netflix. They have that option. You can prefund the paypal account with a few months at a time if you want. Netflix can't screw me over $8. Come on. Who cares if I lose $8? Don't you throw out that much in food every month? If I want to make up the $8, just skip lunch. Work straight through lunch. There's your $8 back.
Check cashing places are expensive and dangerous?
I can cash a check at any Wal-Mart for $3 ($6 if over $2,000). I can cash a check at any Kroger for the same sort of fee, except it's only $1 if less than $50.
The locally-owned grocery chain cashes checks for $5, but only up to $500, but then they do have the best meat counter in town, their sales on sliced cow are awesome, it's often on the way home, gas isn't free, and I do love a good porterhouse.............
Account? No. Present check, present ID, and in the case of the local chain, present thumbprint. A reasonable fee is assessed, cash is dispensed, and done.
I don't consider any of the above to be expensive. I consider it paying for the human time that is involved with dealing with the check I've presented, hopefully with a modest profit (somebody's gotta keep the lights on, and that is us).
None of these establishments are dangerous: FFS, these are the places where I buy my food on a daily basis.
I suppose I could go into one of the payday loan/cash for gold/cash for car title places and cash a check there, but meh: I ain't rich, but I'm not exactly stupid either.
I don't cash checks at my bank unless they're hand-written (stores like them to be printed, as if that adds a layer of authenticity because printers and typewriters are rare somehow). Simple claims to eliminate that nagging need to get to the bank during the day: I just take a picture of the check, hand-written or whatever, and it shows up.
(But not immediately. I get nothing at first, $200 the next day, and the rest the day after that. Allegedly it is like clockwork. I've not used it yet. I expect that it works just as they describe: Simple seem to take a great deal of pride in being as transparent as useful.)
(And I most certainly do not cash hand-written checks at the bank they're drawn on, unless I'm in a terrible hurry: Yes, it is paid in cash as I wait. But some charge check cashing fees for non-account holders that are about triple what I've described above, and slower than the above, and limited to banker's hours. It is disgusting: It's their own check! Again: Fuck banks.)
Kid-proof tablet..
Impressive technology, though I don't agree with some of the testing they do live in production. But important? Hardly. If Netflix went away right *now*, nothing inthe World would really change.
Compared to, say, Google's search going offline which would have a direct impact on both personal and business productivity globally.
Netflix does run their own CDN (based on FreeBSD) for the movies, which are the vast majority of their bandwidth. The Amazon stuff is for the web UI and background processing workloads (e.g. working out popular films related viewing patterns and so). This stuff is pretty busty, especially as more and more people use custom NetFlix apps and so don't hit the web UI at all.
I am TheRaven on Soylent News
I'm one of those individuals who have a problem managing my budget. I once spent $3 on an app for my Droid, which cascaded into $180 in bank fees because the account was overdrawn by a few cents by the time they tabulated everything since the bank (conveniently for them) does charges in such an order that it maximizes the fees instead of minimizing my pain.
First of all, if your bank can charge $180 in overdraft fees for being a few cents over then you really need to get a different bank.
Secondly, if you're in a position where $3 can push you into the red, but you can still manage to afford a smartphone, then you're doing something seriously wrong with your finances.
You should also consider getting a card like a Visa Electron or a Mastercard Maestro - these are debit cards that do not allow you to go overdrawn (they are intended for minors) and will just reject transactions if there is not enough money in the account for them.
I am TheRaven on Soylent News
Instead of just suing people who break their terms of service (which is completely reasonable. If you don't want to abide by the terms, don't use the service), they cram unworkable DRM into open standards. Now we wind up with code running on our own devices that 1) we don't know what it's doing and 2) breaking it open to see what it's doing is a crime.
How can you say that with a straight face? If someone breaks their ToS, downloads thousands of videos and posts them online anonymously, how do you think Netflix will sue them?
If you don't want DRM on your phone, can't you just install a Cyanogenmod ROM that doesn't include the secret DRM bits?
better yet install something with fake drm bits. the drm in netflix can't work perfectly and it doesn't and they know it.
anyways.. uh.. it's pretty much fake/busted drm to begin with. all it aims for is that you can't create a convinient tool to rip their movies to your hd without fuss, or at least I haven't bumped into one yet(and haven't searched). it would be pretty nice because their ui sucks balls. their library in Finland sucks balls too(like 1/20th of the US offering.. mythbusters? yeah, they have all of 3 first seasons).
because _all_ the stuff on netflix - even netflix exclusives - are being released online anonymously today already.
as to the subject matter.. it's pretty stupid if they don't have some people looking at the other cloud providers, since amazon is a direct competitor..
world was created 5 seconds before this post as it is.
Firstly, you should consider actually reading what I wrote before making assumptions about me.
Secondly, the fee structure is similar for many banks: By batching transactions and processing in largest-first order, they ensure the greatest likelihood of a larger number of fees. (This does seem a whole lot like new math, until a banker patiently shows you that 20 - 20.01 = -180.)
Thirdly, again, you should try actually reading. What do you think I just wrote about, if not a debit card? FFS.
Kid-proof tablet..
Secondly, the fee structure is similar for many banks: By batching transactions and processing in largest-first order, they ensure the greatest likelihood of a larger number of fees. (This does seem a whole lot like new math, until a banker patiently shows you that 20 - 20.01 = -180.)
I've never encountered a bank doing this, and if they did then I'd strongly object and report them to the regulator.
Thirdly, again, you should try actually reading. What do you think I just wrote about, if not a debit card? FFS.
You wrote about something like a prepaid charge card. A Maestro or Electron card can be issued by any major bank on an existing account, so you don't need to jump through hoops and pay even more fees.
I am TheRaven on Soylent News
Well, double-reply fail. But here is my report. On Phenom II X6 1045T and 240GT with 8GB, Netflix desktop plays like shit. The audio is OK but the video is stuttery. It's butter-smooth in an XP VM. Netflix Desktop is shit.
"You're right," Fisheye says. "I should have set it on 'whip' or 'chop.'"
Don't blame Netflix. The people that produce the movies and TV shows that people want to watch insist on DRM. So everyone that wants to deliver movies and TV shows digitally (Apple iTunes Store, Netflix, Hulu, Google Play, HBO, etc.), all have to have DRM on every platform that they deliver through, so you have pressure from the media owners and from all of the media vendors to implement DRM. Given that, Google had to decide whether to provide DRM in Android in order to be competitive with Apple. And clearly they decided to support DRM. So if you don't like DRM, blame the media companies that insist on it.
Enable 3D printed prosthetics!
There's no copy protection for VHS in the sense of DRM. The closest to protection on VHS tapes are the weird scrambling schemes that are applied to commercial VHS tapes to make them harder to copy, essentially by distorting the signal so that it just barely plays properly from the original tape, but which causes distortion, screwed up synch, blinking, etc., in copies. And that is a commercial process applied in manufacturing mass-produced tapes, certainly wasn't done to your personal tape.
If I had to guess, perhaps your camcorder was badly misaligned or damaged so that it wrote a bad signal, so your recorded tape couldn't be cleanly copied/digitized. A badly recorded tape would look to the tape duplicator like the intentionally corrupted "protected" tapes. There are plenty of (cheap) devices that can take the corrupted signal and clean it up for copying.
Enable 3D printed prosthetics!
I'd submit that you need to check on what your bank's profit scheme is. Or rather, if it has one. If a bank is in it to make money, find a different bank. Ideally, a local credit union operating as a nonprofit.
For example, I'm a member of my local Community Credit Union. I know the people there, and they know me. My family has banked with them (through various branches) for ten or fifteen years. The two times in the last five years or so that I've had an overdraft, I went in the next day to take care of it, and they offered to reverse the charge.
Again, and I cannot stress this enough...if your bank is in it to make money, you're already losing. If your bank is in it to serve you...then you're getting somewhere.
Bits of code, random ramblings: jakimfett.com
DRM is going to be used whether it's in the standard or not. So you have to pick between making the standard open - so any software company can write tools that comply (proprietary tools by definition) or whether things continue as they are now, and Flash and Silverlight are de facto standards.
I don't think there's any technical or ethical reason to prefer one to the other.
And to be clear: It's not actually DRM. It's just an API. And it's not that much different than Encrypted XML: It's just another standard to encrypt stuff, storing the key separately, to be recombined later. It doesn't proscribe access restrictions or much of anything else that people associate with DRM. I can imagine using it to efficiently encrypt a voice or video chat session between multiple people, for instance.
Wonder what the public key field is for?
I refuse to do business with Netflix, because they send spam. Yes, I have personally received unsolicited commercial E-mail from Netflix, like the people writing at the two links I cite. Any company that uses and/or promotes spam should be boycotted and shunned.
Be who you are...and be it in style!
I fired that bank a long, long time ago.
My new bank is friendly, they remember my name, and I don't know how they make money or what their fee structure is like because all they'll ever get is the $10 that I leave in an account. I use them for the services I detailed previously, and that is all.
I am not interested in conducting financial transactions with another party through any manner of traditional bank, or a credit union. It is not at all advantageous to me in any capacity whatsoever.
(And why is that people who are "members" at a credit union always sound like a fucking Teamster rep whenever anyone says the word "bank"? I don't like your club.)
Kid-proof tablet..
Isn't Macrovision on on the PS3's composite output? I've wondered about that. The only reason I've thought of trying it is to watch something (e.g. documentaries, reality shows) faster than realtime on my recorder that can do it. (Whether you want to believe me or not, I won't record something like that for keeps even if I technically could. As a specific example, I'm downloading the "Under the Dome" episodes from my Tivo for keeps because that's allowed, but actually watching the ones on Amazon Prime since there's no bugs, don't have to manually skip the commercials, etc.)
You really don't think there'd be an "app" for that? Complete with its own enabling (or is that disabling?) DRM? Seriously?
If "the reasons" are poor credit, they can get a secured credit card, and can only spend the amount they put into the account. AFAIK, that is still legally counted as a credit card, NOT as a debit card. I think that also helps them build credit to have future 'regular' credit cards.
(I pay in full every month, so thus end up paying LESS by using my credit card than paying by cash or check, plus it's more convenient to me. No, I don't work for a credit card company.)
First result from "banks reordering transactions":
http://www.forbes.com/sites/halahtouryalai/2013/06/11/yes-banks-are-reordering-your-transactions-and-charging-overdraft-fees/
So, you're against capitalism?
There is Macrovision.
For example, trying to record HBO, even over a composite connection, on a commercial video recorder (e.g. Toshiba XS32) stops the recording because it's copy protected. (You can also have 'copy once' recordings.)
No. I'm against an institution that is supposed to be safeguarding my hard earned cash having a primary goal of separating me from that cash.
I'm actually pretty pro-capitalism...I just think businesses need to be decent and straight forward about it. A great example of this is the way ISPs (or at least the big name ISPs) make their money from hidden fees and charges, some of which only kick in after three or six months, and you only know about them beforehand if you specifically ask about it. I'm fine paying $40 for internet access. I'm not fine with them telling me it's $19.99, and then hiding "...and it goes up to $40 after the first three months" in the fine print.
Bits of code, random ramblings: jakimfett.com