I'll tell you how they make more revenue. Stop the fucking ridiculous spending. Unless you really think that your and my tax money needs to be spent on some of the useless pork that it is going towards. $1 billion for the 2010 Census (because god knows it's that important to count heads, and supposedly they're already at $3 billion of overrun on the cost of doing the 2010 Census), $125 million to renovate Washington DC Sewers (isn't this what that infrastructure improvement fee is for on your water bill?), $850 million for Amtrak (which loses billions a year, isn't it time we just let that company fail?), $75 million for a new State Department Security Training Facility (why can't the FBI just train them?), over $650 million for a new Department of Homeland Security headquarters plus furniture for said HQ. That's getting close to $3 billion dollars worth of wasteful spending, and I'm sure that's just the tip of the iceberg in this spending bonanza.
You are assuming the companies will do the right thing and tax a percent per customer that will add up to just that tax. I predict that they will tell their customers that new $4.50 added fee per month is due to the new imposed tariff by Obama, and laugh as they find yet a new way to make money off of suckers (see also: US Consumers).
That "same old tired right wing argument" is going to land a bunch of Democrats out of jobs in two years if the spending spree fails. Then they can say that the "same old tired right wing argument" caused more unemployment...theirs.
With fucking parachutes, man. With fucking parachutes... *insert joke about bailed out companies having to deliver pizzas via Delta or American Airlines*
Your last sentence hit it right on the head of the nail. If these companies did the right thing, it would hurt their bottom line, and we cannot have that in this economy. T-Mobile stuck me with 2 years of crappy VOIP service because they claim my VOIP line has a $200 ETF if I cancel early, even though my contract (and I have read it through multiple times) covers only wireless service, and does not mention VOIP at all. I told the CSR and Manager both that it was rediculous to have a VOIP service with such a crazy ETF, considering that the entire two years worth of service is only $240 and the equipment can be returned and reused (despite their insistence otherwise). Word to the wise, if T-Mobile offers you $10 VOIP with your wireless plan, tell them to go fuck themselves. Luckily, it's been crapping out lately (hence why I call the service crappy) and every time it goes down, I'm going to call tech support and bitch. Enough times of doing this and either I'll claim that they are not providing adequate service and threaten to take them to court if they don't cancel it or maybe they'll decide I call tech support too much and just cancel my service outright. Either way I'll be a happy dude.
Not only is it their fault, but also, just because AT&T puts in their TOS that you can be charged for the international roaming does not mean they can enforce it when you are in fact, in the US. Just because the dude is on a boat and connected to their cell tower does not mean he is roaming in international water. That doesn't happen until the boat is miles off shore. Until then, the boat, it's passengers and crew, are subject to all US laws, including contracts made with US companies. The dude should not only fight this in court, he should also counter sue for legal fees and mental anguish for having to put up with this bullshit from AT&T. I know a 28k bill would give me a heart attack, and I'm a healthy 27 year old.
I don't know much about Canadian law, but here in the US it's likely you could get them in court. If the provider is unable to provide reasonable means of determining how much you will be billed, you could very likely find them in breach of the very contract they made you sign (here in the US there are quite a few "unfair billing" lawsuits going on related to shady practices by Nextel to hide billing items or conceal charges) and thus you could have a court find in your favor. Of course, this all assumes that you have the money to take them to court, but then again it's likely they'll drop you minus the ETF rather than face the court costs.
For the record, I'm glad it was overturned, as I don't want the government to tell me how to raise my son (although at 19 months old, he's hardly ready to play Mortal Kombat yet). That being said, there is a legitimate argument for controlling the violent garbage in most video games when many parents and retailers are not willing to self police. So what you see as the morality brigade, I see as people who are making the wrong argument for the right reasons. My only major complaint with the "Morality Brigade" is that they also want no nudity anywhere in media, where last I heard, no kid ever went on a slaughter spree or started abusing women after seeing tits and ass.
And you know what, those lawyers probably don't give a fuck other than they are getting paid. Hell, betcha I could find a lawyer who would defend Hitler in German war crimes charges posthumously if he thought he would get really good money out of it. Lawyers are like leeches, they live off of feeding, and in this case, they feed off of money.
I love how people who are pushing family values have an agenda to push, while other people "don't have an agenda." Dude, everyone has an agenda. You are naive if you believe otherwise. There are people who want god as a fixture in every aspect of public life. They have an agenda. There are people who feel that god should never be mentioned in any context in public life. They have an agenda. There are people who don't care. Even THEY have an agenda. Hell, there are people who think we should worship their poodles. Everyone has an agenda, it's the people who's agenda you agree with who you blindly don't see as having an agenda. And he's right, the politicians, in the end, really don't give a rats ass about any of these agendas, by and large. Yeah, some might, but most follow their own separate agenda.
Your response to his post doesn't really make any sense, other than to ignore his argument. What does you having served in the military or voting have to do with the Supreme Court?
I'd hope so, considering the ramifications if they didn't comply. They'd be drug out into the street and forced to watch reruns of The Hills. Oh the horror.
Exactly. Facebook did not give an option to opt out. So unless you are the most clairvoyant motherfucker on the planet and canceled your account a day before this happened, you are fucked. Except that they reverted their ToS because they realized what a shit storm this could become for them.
Well, darn, I was hoping for a legal armada to descend upon Facebook, but looks like they are already in massive damage control. They've reverted back to the old ToS while trying to decide how to word it so that they don't get sued into oblivion. My guess is that the new ToS will allow for a license for fair use only by Facebook (cannot profit in any way off of the content unless explicitly given permission by copyright owner) and that requests to remove content will be honored when requested by copyright owner. Otherwise, expect legal steps to move forward at some source (FCC, FTC, Congress, EPIC, etc). The only thing that would make this worse is if the idiots in Congress wanna bring the Facebook people up to Washington for a public hearing. Fix our damn economy and don't worry about steroids in sports, websites overstepping their ToS bounds, or tits and ass on TV.
What's even better is if lawsuits start appearing on content on Facebook that the user was not the copyright owner and the real owner wants his stuff removed pronto. Seriously, if a class action suit builds steam, even the mighty legal team with Facebook may have a shit storm on their hands. Not that I'm expecting it, seeing as how there are plenty of apathetic people to go around in this country.
Keep in mind that just because they created this new ToS doesn't mean it's going to stand up in court. I don't think it'll take too long to see a lawsuit over this, and then we'll see if that ToS is as rock solid as their lawyers believe. One thing that really could hurt Facebook in any impending lawsuit is their failure to notify customers of a change in the ToS. My knowledge of contract law is elementary at best, so perhaps someone who is an expert in this area could clear this up. I know that some companies (see also: all banks and creditors) will notify customers of any changes to their legal terms of service, but I am not sure if this is a requirement just for financial institutions. If not, it sure would be a good thing for organizations such as Consumers Union to lobby for.
I'll give you the trackball is flimsy, but if yours feels flimsy, you should get it exchanged. Mine is solid as a rock, and the slider is still in perfect shape after very heavy use (including getting played with by my 19 month old son who's, how shall I put this, not electronic friendly).
The prices do fluctuate from area to area, and it's possible that in your area, Verizon just can't expect to make more on the plan than 39.99. I'm sure I can get a discount on that rate (wife works for a hospital that is a partner with Verizon) but even with that, up until the storm I wasn't even that thrilled with the selection of smart phones that they carry. I had no intention of buying the iPhone, so I decided to get the G1 and haven't regretted the decision yet.
Well, other than the camera on the phone sucking like a Dyson, the available software for the phone is starting to get reasonable (still a ways off from being at the level of the software available for the iPhone currently) and there is no soft keyboard yet (although it will be included in an OTA in the near future). Also, if you rely on having Exchange support on your phone, it's not ready yet (Aardvark is going to be released as a program that will give Exchange support for the G1 but it is in beta at the moment). As a consumer smart phone it's great, especially considering the APIs to develop for the platform are easy to work with (Java APIs). As a corporate smart phone, it still has some work to be done (likely that a future phone, rather than the G1, will be developed with the corporate user in mind). Oh yeah, almost forgot, no 3.5" mic jack, but it comes with an adapter that connects to the USB slot. The problem is this uses up that slot, although you can buy an adapter that does this and gives you a USB connector to hook up to.
They'll have to do like any other company who has survived through serious market changes in any business, they'll need to adapt. I know it's a pipe dream, but I'd like to see them adapt a model that focuses on revenues from services and support and switches their platform to a FOSS. I'm not naive enough to think it'll happen, but if I was CEO, that's the direction I would move towards.
Honestly, performance in EDGE (I have no 3G either) is pretty reasonable. Granted, sites like ESPN take a minute or so to pull up, but google searches and non-graphic intensive stuff like mobile portals and text-based sites are fine. Honestly I always would like faster, but the other day I did a google voice search (yeah, voice search, and it actually freakin' works) for a deli sandwich place at a red light and got the phone number and dialed (by tapping on the phone number on the webpage) before the light went green.
The longest I've ever gone between charges on the G1 was literally 5 days. And that's 5 days of normal use. Granted, I was at the point where I had like 5% battery life and my phone was threatening to shut down completely, but I was amazed. And you are right, I've noticed as the updates come in, it does tend to get better.
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I'll tell you how they make more revenue. Stop the fucking ridiculous spending. Unless you really think that your and my tax money needs to be spent on some of the useless pork that it is going towards. $1 billion for the 2010 Census (because god knows it's that important to count heads, and supposedly they're already at $3 billion of overrun on the cost of doing the 2010 Census), $125 million to renovate Washington DC Sewers (isn't this what that infrastructure improvement fee is for on your water bill?), $850 million for Amtrak (which loses billions a year, isn't it time we just let that company fail?), $75 million for a new State Department Security Training Facility (why can't the FBI just train them?), over $650 million for a new Department of Homeland Security headquarters plus furniture for said HQ. That's getting close to $3 billion dollars worth of wasteful spending, and I'm sure that's just the tip of the iceberg in this spending bonanza.
You are assuming the companies will do the right thing and tax a percent per customer that will add up to just that tax. I predict that they will tell their customers that new $4.50 added fee per month is due to the new imposed tariff by Obama, and laugh as they find yet a new way to make money off of suckers (see also: US Consumers).
That "same old tired right wing argument" is going to land a bunch of Democrats out of jobs in two years if the spending spree fails. Then they can say that the "same old tired right wing argument" caused more unemployment...theirs.
With fucking parachutes, man. With fucking parachutes... *insert joke about bailed out companies having to deliver pizzas via Delta or American Airlines*
Your last sentence hit it right on the head of the nail. If these companies did the right thing, it would hurt their bottom line, and we cannot have that in this economy. T-Mobile stuck me with 2 years of crappy VOIP service because they claim my VOIP line has a $200 ETF if I cancel early, even though my contract (and I have read it through multiple times) covers only wireless service, and does not mention VOIP at all. I told the CSR and Manager both that it was rediculous to have a VOIP service with such a crazy ETF, considering that the entire two years worth of service is only $240 and the equipment can be returned and reused (despite their insistence otherwise). Word to the wise, if T-Mobile offers you $10 VOIP with your wireless plan, tell them to go fuck themselves. Luckily, it's been crapping out lately (hence why I call the service crappy) and every time it goes down, I'm going to call tech support and bitch. Enough times of doing this and either I'll claim that they are not providing adequate service and threaten to take them to court if they don't cancel it or maybe they'll decide I call tech support too much and just cancel my service outright. Either way I'll be a happy dude.
Not only is it their fault, but also, just because AT&T puts in their TOS that you can be charged for the international roaming does not mean they can enforce it when you are in fact, in the US. Just because the dude is on a boat and connected to their cell tower does not mean he is roaming in international water. That doesn't happen until the boat is miles off shore. Until then, the boat, it's passengers and crew, are subject to all US laws, including contracts made with US companies. The dude should not only fight this in court, he should also counter sue for legal fees and mental anguish for having to put up with this bullshit from AT&T. I know a 28k bill would give me a heart attack, and I'm a healthy 27 year old.
I don't know much about Canadian law, but here in the US it's likely you could get them in court. If the provider is unable to provide reasonable means of determining how much you will be billed, you could very likely find them in breach of the very contract they made you sign (here in the US there are quite a few "unfair billing" lawsuits going on related to shady practices by Nextel to hide billing items or conceal charges) and thus you could have a court find in your favor. Of course, this all assumes that you have the money to take them to court, but then again it's likely they'll drop you minus the ETF rather than face the court costs.
You may be able to find a lawyer who would defend Hitler. I, in turn, would be able to find a thousand who wouldn't, at any price.
Law is a messy business, but most lawyers I know have a working moral compass.
That points straight to their bank account.
I don't. You eat food? That's so 1990's.
For the record, I'm glad it was overturned, as I don't want the government to tell me how to raise my son (although at 19 months old, he's hardly ready to play Mortal Kombat yet). That being said, there is a legitimate argument for controlling the violent garbage in most video games when many parents and retailers are not willing to self police. So what you see as the morality brigade, I see as people who are making the wrong argument for the right reasons. My only major complaint with the "Morality Brigade" is that they also want no nudity anywhere in media, where last I heard, no kid ever went on a slaughter spree or started abusing women after seeing tits and ass.
Okay...and that still doesn't make his post make any more sense. Nice try though.
And you know what, those lawyers probably don't give a fuck other than they are getting paid. Hell, betcha I could find a lawyer who would defend Hitler in German war crimes charges posthumously if he thought he would get really good money out of it. Lawyers are like leeches, they live off of feeding, and in this case, they feed off of money.
I love how people who are pushing family values have an agenda to push, while other people "don't have an agenda." Dude, everyone has an agenda. You are naive if you believe otherwise. There are people who want god as a fixture in every aspect of public life. They have an agenda. There are people who feel that god should never be mentioned in any context in public life. They have an agenda. There are people who don't care. Even THEY have an agenda. Hell, there are people who think we should worship their poodles. Everyone has an agenda, it's the people who's agenda you agree with who you blindly don't see as having an agenda. And he's right, the politicians, in the end, really don't give a rats ass about any of these agendas, by and large. Yeah, some might, but most follow their own separate agenda.
Your response to his post doesn't really make any sense, other than to ignore his argument. What does you having served in the military or voting have to do with the Supreme Court?
I'd hope so, considering the ramifications if they didn't comply. They'd be drug out into the street and forced to watch reruns of The Hills. Oh the horror.
Exactly. Facebook did not give an option to opt out. So unless you are the most clairvoyant motherfucker on the planet and canceled your account a day before this happened, you are fucked. Except that they reverted their ToS because they realized what a shit storm this could become for them.
Well, darn, I was hoping for a legal armada to descend upon Facebook, but looks like they are already in massive damage control. They've reverted back to the old ToS while trying to decide how to word it so that they don't get sued into oblivion. My guess is that the new ToS will allow for a license for fair use only by Facebook (cannot profit in any way off of the content unless explicitly given permission by copyright owner) and that requests to remove content will be honored when requested by copyright owner. Otherwise, expect legal steps to move forward at some source (FCC, FTC, Congress, EPIC, etc). The only thing that would make this worse is if the idiots in Congress wanna bring the Facebook people up to Washington for a public hearing. Fix our damn economy and don't worry about steroids in sports, websites overstepping their ToS bounds, or tits and ass on TV.
What's even better is if lawsuits start appearing on content on Facebook that the user was not the copyright owner and the real owner wants his stuff removed pronto. Seriously, if a class action suit builds steam, even the mighty legal team with Facebook may have a shit storm on their hands. Not that I'm expecting it, seeing as how there are plenty of apathetic people to go around in this country.
Keep in mind that just because they created this new ToS doesn't mean it's going to stand up in court. I don't think it'll take too long to see a lawsuit over this, and then we'll see if that ToS is as rock solid as their lawyers believe. One thing that really could hurt Facebook in any impending lawsuit is their failure to notify customers of a change in the ToS. My knowledge of contract law is elementary at best, so perhaps someone who is an expert in this area could clear this up. I know that some companies (see also: all banks and creditors) will notify customers of any changes to their legal terms of service, but I am not sure if this is a requirement just for financial institutions. If not, it sure would be a good thing for organizations such as Consumers Union to lobby for.
I'll give you the trackball is flimsy, but if yours feels flimsy, you should get it exchanged. Mine is solid as a rock, and the slider is still in perfect shape after very heavy use (including getting played with by my 19 month old son who's, how shall I put this, not electronic friendly).
The prices do fluctuate from area to area, and it's possible that in your area, Verizon just can't expect to make more on the plan than 39.99. I'm sure I can get a discount on that rate (wife works for a hospital that is a partner with Verizon) but even with that, up until the storm I wasn't even that thrilled with the selection of smart phones that they carry. I had no intention of buying the iPhone, so I decided to get the G1 and haven't regretted the decision yet.
anything else a potential buyer should consider?
Well, other than the camera on the phone sucking like a Dyson, the available software for the phone is starting to get reasonable (still a ways off from being at the level of the software available for the iPhone currently) and there is no soft keyboard yet (although it will be included in an OTA in the near future). Also, if you rely on having Exchange support on your phone, it's not ready yet (Aardvark is going to be released as a program that will give Exchange support for the G1 but it is in beta at the moment). As a consumer smart phone it's great, especially considering the APIs to develop for the platform are easy to work with (Java APIs). As a corporate smart phone, it still has some work to be done (likely that a future phone, rather than the G1, will be developed with the corporate user in mind). Oh yeah, almost forgot, no 3.5" mic jack, but it comes with an adapter that connects to the USB slot. The problem is this uses up that slot, although you can buy an adapter that does this and gives you a USB connector to hook up to.
They'll have to do like any other company who has survived through serious market changes in any business, they'll need to adapt. I know it's a pipe dream, but I'd like to see them adapt a model that focuses on revenues from services and support and switches their platform to a FOSS. I'm not naive enough to think it'll happen, but if I was CEO, that's the direction I would move towards.
Honestly, performance in EDGE (I have no 3G either) is pretty reasonable. Granted, sites like ESPN take a minute or so to pull up, but google searches and non-graphic intensive stuff like mobile portals and text-based sites are fine. Honestly I always would like faster, but the other day I did a google voice search (yeah, voice search, and it actually freakin' works) for a deli sandwich place at a red light and got the phone number and dialed (by tapping on the phone number on the webpage) before the light went green.
The longest I've ever gone between charges on the G1 was literally 5 days. And that's 5 days of normal use. Granted, I was at the point where I had like 5% battery life and my phone was threatening to shut down completely, but I was amazed. And you are right, I've noticed as the updates come in, it does tend to get better.