to make the device only usable by their service, but I think they should take a different approach.
Ever tried to buy a cellphone without the service? It's expensive as hell. They always sell those as a loss-leader because they will make it up on the service. Nobody has a problem with that. If you buy the service, it's $10, if not, it's $300. The I-Opener should be sold the same way.
If someone wants a cute Linux box for $299, then maybe they'll go that way, if not, don't. Don't get mad at a company for not wanting to take a huge loss on their product.
Why does everyone think they should get everything for free?
Seems like many of the banks use this same company as well. I used one of these for about a year through my bank. During the year, I came across a few problems...
The biggest annoyance for me was the delay time on every check you write. When you write a check, you typically have at least a 6-7 day wait before it will go out. If you are on top of things, this might not be a problem. I found myself periodically "discovering" a bill I set aside, and had to manually write a check anyway to get it out quicker.
The upside to that, is that they establish electronic relationships with many companies, and often the check is delivered instantly on that day, in some cases making it quicker.
Unless you pay a lot of bills, the minimum fee is higher than you will pay for postage. For some, maybe the convience is worth it. For me, I write so few checks, that it's easier for me to just handle them as they come in.
At least with my bank, I periodically had problems connecting to the site, and during this time, I couldn't check on the payment status, or write any new checks. Mostly just a pain. I have no idea if it was the banks problem or the services.
Like I said, it was worth doing as an experiment over the past year, but I recently cancelled my subscription. I decided that doing things the old fashioned way seemed to work the best for me.
I'm not sure if it's visa problems, or companies not willing to sponsor people or what, but I have tried for years to get a tech job in Europe. Nobody seems to want anything I have to offer (not true in the US). I submit resumes to these companies, and often here that they don't work with people out of their own countries. Whatever. If there was a consulting company that specialized in this, I would love to sign up.
I agree completely with this. Luckily, I only interview a few people a month. I am AMAZED at the lack of skills that people come in with. The resume looks good, and the conduct themselves well, but lets get to the questions:
Delete a node from a doubly-linked list...
I explain...
Eventually, it is wrong, or coded in such an unreal manner. According to the resume, they've been working as a software developer for seven years....
Okay, I suppose it's possible that someone might have been doing some embedded programming, or something where dynamic memory allocation wasn't possible. I ask them to flip the bits in a byte. This is usually met with a blank stare, maybe some shuffling in the chair.
How do these people get here? I mean, I know they get past HR and headhunters because the resume sounds good, but have these people actually been working? I have no idea. I just that out of the last 20 people I've interviewed, maybe two of them could do either of those problems, and none of them did both. I don't even go into the meatier questions.
I'm not asking for a lot, but I think that anyone that has passed a 200 level college data structures class should be able to do the first problem, and someone should at least be able to grasp the concept of the second. All I can figure is that our colleges and universities care far more about generating profit than they do turning out knowledgeable graduates.
Face it, they make no more money from someone for kicking them out...
What I want to know, is how much work is required to maintain the thing. Anyone running a W95,W98 or W2K box knows you can't just use it from day to day. You have to go through and delete crap that applications leave behind, defrag the hard drive, back up your registry, etc... What do you do on this thing when the system ends up corrupted from some insane number of DirectX upgrades, and you need to start fresh? Does it come with a full copy of W2K? If not, where do you get it when the system dies? How long is it going to take to boot?
I just can't see this being any more than a hacked version of Windows, with enough kludgy hacks on it to make it a game machine. I can't see it ever replacing the simplicity of just being able to put in a game, turn it on, play, turn it off (even in the middle of a game). I don't want a computer for a game console - I want an appliance.
Entertaining in a campy sort of way though. It had nothing to do with the main storyline of the show, as do most of the "monster" episodes, but was at least a little entertaining. I can think of plenty of episodes that were worse. As far as making a statement about FPS games, I wouldn't think FOX would want to shoot themselves in the foot. I bet a HUGE percentage of their audience are gamers.
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Ever tried to buy a cellphone without the service? It's expensive as hell. They always sell those as a loss-leader because they will make it up on the service. Nobody has a problem with that. If you buy the service, it's $10, if not, it's $300. The I-Opener should be sold the same way.
If someone wants a cute Linux box for $299, then maybe they'll go that way, if not, don't. Don't get mad at a company for not wanting to take a huge loss on their product.
Why does everyone think they should get everything for free?
The biggest annoyance for me was the delay time on every check you write. When you write a check, you typically have at least a 6-7 day wait before it will go out. If you are on top of things, this might not be a problem. I found myself periodically "discovering" a bill I set aside, and had to manually write a check anyway to get it out quicker.
The upside to that, is that they establish electronic relationships with many companies, and often the check is delivered instantly on that day, in some cases making it quicker.
Unless you pay a lot of bills, the minimum fee is higher than you will pay for postage. For some, maybe the convience is worth it. For me, I write so few checks, that it's easier for me to just handle them as they come in.
At least with my bank, I periodically had problems connecting to the site, and during this time, I couldn't check on the payment status, or write any new checks. Mostly just a pain. I have no idea if it was the banks problem or the services.
Like I said, it was worth doing as an experiment over the past year, but I recently cancelled my subscription. I decided that doing things the old fashioned way seemed to work the best for me.
I'm not sure if it's visa problems, or companies not willing to sponsor people or what, but I have tried for years to get a tech job in Europe. Nobody seems to want anything I have to offer (not true in the US). I submit resumes to these companies, and often here that they don't work with people out of their own countries. Whatever. If there was a consulting company that specialized in this, I would love to sign up.
Delete a node from a doubly-linked list...
I explain...
Eventually, it is wrong, or coded in such an unreal manner. According to the resume, they've been working as a software developer for seven years....
Okay, I suppose it's possible that someone might have been doing some embedded programming, or something where dynamic memory allocation wasn't possible. I ask them to flip the bits in a byte. This is usually met with a blank stare, maybe some shuffling in the chair.
How do these people get here? I mean, I know they get past HR and headhunters because the resume sounds good, but have these people actually been working? I have no idea. I just that out of the last 20 people I've interviewed, maybe two of them could do either of those problems, and none of them did both. I don't even go into the meatier questions.
I'm not asking for a lot, but I think that anyone that has passed a 200 level college data structures class should be able to do the first problem, and someone should at least be able to grasp the concept of the second. All I can figure is that our colleges and universities care far more about generating profit than they do turning out knowledgeable graduates.
Face it, they make no more money from someone for kicking them out...
I just can't see this being any more than a hacked version of Windows, with enough kludgy hacks on it to make it a game machine. I can't see it ever replacing the simplicity of just being able to put in a game, turn it on, play, turn it off (even in the middle of a game). I don't want a computer for a game console - I want an appliance.
Entertaining in a campy sort of way though. It had nothing to do with the main storyline of the show, as do most of the "monster" episodes, but was at least a little entertaining. I can think of plenty of episodes that were worse. As far as making a statement about FPS games, I wouldn't think FOX would want to shoot themselves in the foot. I bet a HUGE percentage of their audience are gamers.