Actually it does have to do with the cablecard. The first version of the card spec is one-way, meaning any services that send data back to the cable/satellite company can't happen. Cable works around it by allow you to call in to 'order' you On-Demand content with the old V1 cablecard. Yes, cablecards are decryption devices, but they also replace a cable box that does more than simple decryption.
V2 was supposed to allow 2-Way communication to work around the issue, but I think the market simply petered out before it gained any acceptance. It was already nearly impossible to find a TV that supported V1, let alone V2.
On a related topic: Does anyone have any recent news on the status of these boxes being required to have a port to save your recordings? I know the FCC was talking about removing that requirement. Hopefully this move will spur competition in that area as well and keep the options to save recorded material to an external drive.
It is different, at least for Windows and OS X, in that the OS is relatively unified under 4 or 5 variants (OS X 10.5-10.6) and Windows XP - Win7), whereas under Android, they have hundreds of different hardware variations (albeit the same basic chips for the most part), in additional to various Android OS flavors on top of each of those hundreds of hardware variations. It's probably more akin to a different Linux distro for each handset, although that may be a bit of a stretch.
Personally I think software fragmentation is one of the key pieces that holds Linux back from wide adoption by companies like Steam and Microsoft. Where Windows and OS X have a relatively stable (albeit moving slowly) target for the OS, they can assume that the current footprint will remain stable for 2-4 years and a new iteration probably won't change things too drastically. The basic infrastructure for the OS is standard however, which is key. In Linux, even the method for getting packages into the OS varies by distribution. Mix in new window managers, File managers, etc, and it just becomes too much to bother with.
I really wish Google had kept a sterner hand at the keel for Android standards. A well polished infrastructure to assist handset vendors in get-current-stay-current would have been a good start. Instead it seems they just throw it at the wall and sometimes it sticks. Sometimes you can be a little TOO wild west, to the point where it becomes detrimental (IE6 is a good example of that) where folks stray to much from a standard and the developer and the end users pay the price.
And therein lies your problem. As a developer, you most likely don't understand what works for an end user. Linux and the 'year of the desktop' is a perfect example of Linux Developer esthetics. Although they have made great strides over the years, they aren't keeping up on many areas, and Linux remains a small niche product, free though it may be.
A developer can create a truly beautiful technical piece of coding wizardry, but when it comes to design esthetics, they usually suck ass, not to put too fine a point on it. To compound the matter, they will become overly defensive when their design choices are questioned. Too many see it as a personal attack, either on their own design choices, or the platform in general. The blogs and support forums are full of such discourse.
"Why would you ever want to do such a thing..it's stupid" "Did you even open a terminal and READ the MAN page?" "Because it's easier this way" "Your a dumbass. This is the proper way and if you would only stop to think..."
I had a project a few years ago to design a service request system for our end users. I was paired with a business representative to make sure their needs were represented. I hated that woman for the first month. The inane requests for 'features' was astounding and neverending, but in the end, they are the folks who 'use' it and design choices should reflect their needs, not what you think their needs are. It was a painful lesson in more ways than one.
Tragedy? Perhaps the things that you believe are so crucial are just not important in the larger scheme of things. Did you ever stop to think that perhaps you are the fringe element and mainstream simply doesn't care that they can't install some random app from some random developer? A quarter of a million apps does a lot to allay fears of a 'restrictive' platform. Linux is totally free and open, yet it too struggles with mainstream acceptance. Did you ever stop to wonder if perhaps being open and free wasn't all that's needed for success? If it's obviously not working there, why would you expect it to a shoe-in for some other platform?
A Tragedy? Hardly. A tragedy was 9/11. This is just inconvenient to geeks and business as usual for businesses. For iJoe, it's all irrelevant.
The bug is specific to Chrome. I thought it was specific to the OS X build. A simple workaround is to simply launch another browser to post with as the bug doesn't affect Firefox or Safari. I didn't stoop to trying IE though.
Well said. The knee-jerk reactions in here aside, parents have always tried and partially succeeded in controlling what their children see and hear. It is as much a part of parenting as feeding and clothing them. The electronic age took a huge chunk of control away from parents. Prior to wide availability of the internet, a child's exposure to such was limited to the occasional glimpse in a porn magazine, and what passed for risque on TV. When web sites started hitting wider audiences, early sites even had to opt into warning people that they were going to see something for adults. Much of it is still setup in such a self policing manner and of course the viewer can still ignore the warning.
I don't think anyone is claiming a parent can control a child 24x7, but it is certainly necessary to ensure they follow the rules and aren't exposed to things the parents don't want them to see. The way people in here are speaking, you would think parents might as well hand them a dvd of 2 Girls 1 Cup now to spare them the shock of seeing it when they are 18.
In the end, it's really no ones business but the parents as to how far they go to control their own children.
More likely it made news because it doesn't have to be some certified or confirmed event to be newsworthy. Don't' forget we use a mod system for a story to even get this far to begin with. Obviously it is of interest to a large number of folks. As news sites go, I prefer this method as we essentially choose our own headlines. If only 'certified' events, known facts, and 'proven' theories (is there such a thing?) made news, we wouldn't have much left to talk about and we would hear about them after the fact more likely as not. I come here for such news, be it from Linux, OS X, Windows, potential future gadgets, random tech talk, or whatever. The day that Apple news is no longer news for nerds is the day/. has lost it's way. It is as much a part of nerd history as Linux, Unix, Windows and everything else PC.
I find it interesting that the Apple haters are whining (aren't they always?) about an Apple story being posted, yet they are silent when a story about 'potential' Android developers 2-3 years from now isn't even blinked at. A bit of a double standard there don't you think? I personally consider such conjecture news as well, even about an android story even though I don't own any of those devices. Surprise, not everyone is a fanatic to the point where we can't stomach hearing about news from either 'camp'. If someone's dislike of a company is getting so extreme that they can't stomach even hearing said company's name, perhaps it's time to take a break away from the PC and a few internet blogs.
This site encompasses more than just a singular personal pronoun.
Last but not least, if they didn't want to hear such stories, why oh why do they always flock in droves to read and then comment on them?
Same here. Although I primarily use Plex for media, netflix, hulu, etc. It will re-encode MP4 audio on the fly to AC3 for those external tuners, supports Lanczos3 for resizing on those big TV's, and it plays pretty much anything you throw at it.
I did a little surgery on the drive bay so that I could cram a 1 GB drive in there (takes a bit of chopping at the plastic bits to make the 12.5 mm fit) but it makes a fine HTPC. It also comes with a built in SPIDF which is nice. All it required was a DVI to HDMI cable, and a TOSLINK cable that I picked up for about $2 bucks.
Didn't apple put one of those out a few years ago? You tilted it on it's axis to get a landscape or portrait view?
As to the general discussion at hand, I just buy a higher res monitor. For example, my new iMac comes with a 16:9 monitor (2560 x 1440) where the old 24" was 16:10. From my perspective, going from a 16:10 24" display at 1920 x 1200 to a higher res of 2560 x 1440 is a logic step, even taking the wider aspect into account.
In short, stop buying displays with low resolutions.
I find it funny that everyone is now out to defend torrents since Apple opted now to allow torrent software, yet they despise DRM on games, which is primarily a direct result of copyright infringement. Before the internet was largely available, copyright protection was basically very simple with little dongles, or bad tracks on a CD or floppy to prevent casual copying. When online sharing became common, the DRM went out of control as a result.
It's difficult in my mind to defend torrents knowing that it's probably realistic that more people use them to infringe copyrights then they do for legal content, especially since the folks who infringe are probably the same ones that cause me a ton of grief with the current DRM schemes in use.
Here in the U.S., the population is rife with people who abuse social services to the tune of billions of dollars a year and then turn around and throw the 'big socialism' boogeyman on the cross when they need to win an election.
From TFA:
Cranick, who lives outside the city limits, admits he "forgot" to pay the annual $75 fee. The county does not have a county-wide firefighting service, but South Fulton offers fire coverage to rural residents for a fee.
This man deserved what he got. He isn't terminally ill. he isn't poor or on welfare. He as much as admits he's just stupid.
And that in turn is why people abuse the current system. They know the billing will be 'sorted out later' and then never pay it. The taxpayer picks up the tab, which I would imagine is what would happen if the fire service had put out this guy's house fire. At that point it already cost far more than $75 dollars.
You never know what the whole story is. If I were desperately trying to keep my head above water and avoid foreclosure, I might let this fee lapse, assuming the chance of losing my house to foreclosure is much greater than losing it to a fire. Now I have no idea whether that's the situation or not, but I would agree that it should follow health care rules, i.e. that an emergency room is obligated to help a patient and sort out the billing later.
You don't pay taxes in Europe? You pay for it whether you realize it or not. In this case, this individual is in a separate county, so his taxes did not pay for that service. He is frankly no eligible to receive those services if he didn't pay for them.
As for me, I would never be so stupid as to refuse to pay a $75 dollar fee for fire service.
An interesting sub-topic to be sure. Do you think he had the right to expect those services to be available to him knowing that he refused to pay into the system? I wasn't referring to the larger question of the legality of Health Care and I don't want to get too side tracked from the topic at hand with such. I was more interested in the fact that he refused to pay for the service and then expected them to provide such services for the original fee after it became an emergency.
I see that as very similar to folks who refuse to pay for health insurance, and then expect to be able to go to the emergency room for treatment. It just struck me as a little too close in general situation to the health care debate.
Why does this remind me of the health care argument? People claiming that this sort of things is optional and they shouldn't have to pay, knowing in their minds that it's only a matter of time before they DO need to rely on that service. I have no sympathy for this family. They should have been responsible citizens and paid their dues just like everyone else, instead of assuming they could freeload off the system in an emergency.
My thoughts exactly. This reminds me of 'Pre-N' wireless, which took far too long to ratify a standard that was already in wide use. They sat on their asses so long, it became a joke in the industry. If the governing body takes this long to certify it and they are claiming 'years' more in the future before the standard is finalized, then something is broken. This smacks of Google's 'beta' status. Eventually you have to shit and get off the pot.
Essentially they just need to finalize it, and for those bits that aren't production ready, defer them to HTML6.
There are also theories that without the moon, the earth would wobble uncontrollably with no set axis. Imagine the chaos is that turned out to be true;)
There's also an error in the summary. TFA states the planet actually has 3 earth masses not 20% to 50% of Earth's mass, which makes sense. It's also tide locked like our moon is to Earth.
Apple has to stick to law like anybody else, and if they're using anti-competitive tactics they deserve to be called out for the cheats they are.
The only people this ban on core functionality harms is a developer who chooses to delve into those areas. They could also go to any number of other smartphone manufacturer's, who are far larger than apple. It is not anti-competitive under the definition of the law. Even Android keeps some core functions closed.
You're confusing Core Apps with Core Functionality. A calculator is not what I would consider a core function of a smartphone, and neither is a clock or a voice recorder. Calendar (PIM)'s can have a vast array of choices and functions that a basic calendar does not deliver, and I'm betting that Apple doesn't consider a basic calendar db that holds dates core functionality either.
That's like saying 95% of police Officers aren't corrupt. 5% being rejected is actually HUGE.
Sure it's a decent number of apps given that there is something like a quater of a million apps, but its a small percent of the whole. These are also folks that broke the rules, not some innocent victim. Yes there are rare cases where an app is rejected for stupid reasons, but those reasons were spelled out in the dev agreement.
The sense of entitlement of some people these days is amazing. They agreed to the developer agreement, willfully break it, and then act shocked when they get their hand slapped. Then people come in here and say it's a 'HUGE' problem, knowing you created the problem. I hate to break it to you, but this is how business works. You don't get to write your own rules FOSS style when contracting with another business. The developer agreement is a legal agreement. You dont' get to change the rules on a whim. Shocking, I know.
Yet if you look through the App store and you read the developer blogs, you find that the App store is rife with violations.
I'm not surprised violations get through. There are over 200,000 apps in the store. When they find them, they remove them.
There are so many retarded restrictions that if Apple had seriously enforced their policies a large portion of Apps should have vanished by now. This huge ambiguity leaves Apple to reign supreme.
[Citation Needed] There are, what, 12 core apps, each pretty specific in the function it performs. Apparently there are at least 200,000 other things you can do on the platform without bumping into that functionality. It doesn't seem that hard.
95% are compliant. Of the 5% that aren't, most knowingly broke the rules themselves. The others chose to delve into areas that are open to the whim of personal opinion, such as adult material, or 'obscene'. Guess what? If you design an little sticky notes app, chances are pretty rock solid it won't get banned for being obscene.
This isn't rocket science. Something those dev's who raked in a billion in cash have figured out. Don't try to cheat the system and you'll do fine. If you realize you can't pass up the chance to cheat it, then iOS is not for you.
You do realize that Apple has paid out over a billion dollars to developers? I always enjoy these off the cuff statemetns about how poorly Apple Developers are treated when the simple fact is, that it is a lucrative market, which is why 3 of 4 still plan to develop for it in the immediate future. (ref: http://news.cnet.com/8301-31021_3-20007010-260.html)
Assuming they create a good product, they are treated very well, getting an instant distribution model that functions at break even. Not a bad deal at all.
Given the way that Apple treats 3rd party devs and the locked down phone, it would be very surprising if Apple keeps their loyalty without making a major course correction. Those dick moves like randomly rejecting applications and stealing functionality out of apps for the base system isn't really endearing them with the people they need to keep the appstore vibrant.
The simple fact is that a huge majority of apps are approved within 2 weeks. Of those that are rejected, almost unilaterally they violated the developer agreement, and then complain about it after the fact. Google Voice was a good example. At the time it was developed, it offered unlimited texting, which duplicated core functionality, which of course is listed in black in white the agreement.
I know it's popular to love to hate Apple lately, but the simple fact is that the majority of apps are rejected because the developer took a chance and ignored the agreement. I will grant that some of these rejections seem a bit stupid.
Given that 95% percent are accepted without any issue at all, leaving only 5% of questionable apps, the argument that Apple is rejecting apps willy nilly is not exactly a good reflection of reality.
That is the point. If you did a search for video ipod, you may end up with hits on video pod as well. In addition, if you are presented with a list of 10 products, and one of them looks and sounds familiar, you may be more likely to choose the one more familiar to you (this effect is also common during voting season when choosing names from a list. People are more comfortable with the 'familiar').
If a company purposely names their product similarly to another product, with the intent to profit off of that similarity, then it meets the basic definition of trademark infringement.
The two products do NOT have to be the same in form or function. This seems to be where many people get confused about trademarks. Although the more common infringement cases revolve around similar or identical products, that is not always the case.
I doubt Apple will pursue the 'similar products' tack as it doesn't seem like a strong case. Although both devices present video the consumer, they would be difficult to confuse. I believe they will most likely pursue this on the 'branding' side of things, which has no requirement that products are similar.
Where the respective marks or products or services are not identical, similarity will generally be assessed by reference to whether there is a likelihood of confusion that consumers will believe the products or services originated from the trademark owner. Likelihood of confusion is not necessarily measured by actual consumer confusion, though normally one of the elements, but by a series of criteria Courts have established. A prime example is the test announced by the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals in AMF, Inc v Sleekcraft Boats, 599 F.2d 341 (C.A.9) 1979. The Court there announced eight specific elements to measure likelihood of confusion: Strength of the mark Proximity of the goods Similarity of the marks Evidence of actual confusion Marketing channels used Type of goods and the degree of care likely to be exercised by the purchaser Defendant's intent in selecting the mark Likelihood of expansion of the product lines
Irrelevant if Apple was the one to trademark 'iPod' with their media player, and they made it a common household name. Showing a reference to a word in a dictionary isn't going to get this start-up anywhere either. No one said that using the word 'pod' is a trademark violation, and it doesn't meet the definition of a trademark infringement.
The fact that they have a media projector called a 'Video Pod' makes the case relevant as it takes on a whole new meaning.
Not really, Pod [reference.com] has been used in that fashion for a really long time. Or at least way longer than Apple has used the word as a part of its trademark.
In this case, I think it's justified. Using a media device called a Video Pod could indeed be confused with the Apple Trademark, which is the entire point of a trademark. Words such as Podium wouldn't be of course, but in this case, I would think it's warranted.
If Apple were to release some new gadget and call it "iDroid", you can bet Google would be all over their ass, and with good reason. Borrowing another's trademark with the intent to leverage another's success is a perfect example of trademark infringement.
For a home user, not a big deal. For an business environment, much more so. Dismissing it as 'nothing to see' is shortsighted at best, especially when considering the backdoor left by the hack.
Slashdot Mirror
Actually it does have to do with the cablecard. The first version of the card spec is one-way, meaning any services that send data back to the cable/satellite company can't happen. Cable works around it by allow you to call in to 'order' you On-Demand content with the old V1 cablecard. Yes, cablecards are decryption devices, but they also replace a cable box that does more than simple decryption.
V2 was supposed to allow 2-Way communication to work around the issue, but I think the market simply petered out before it gained any acceptance. It was already nearly impossible to find a TV that supported V1, let alone V2.
On a related topic: Does anyone have any recent news on the status of these boxes being required to have a port to save your recordings? I know the FCC was talking about removing that requirement. Hopefully this move will spur competition in that area as well and keep the options to save recorded material to an external drive.
It is different, at least for Windows and OS X, in that the OS is relatively unified under 4 or 5 variants (OS X 10.5-10.6) and Windows XP - Win7), whereas under Android, they have hundreds of different hardware variations (albeit the same basic chips for the most part), in additional to various Android OS flavors on top of each of those hundreds of hardware variations. It's probably more akin to a different Linux distro for each handset, although that may be a bit of a stretch.
Personally I think software fragmentation is one of the key pieces that holds Linux back from wide adoption by companies like Steam and Microsoft. Where Windows and OS X have a relatively stable (albeit moving slowly) target for the OS, they can assume that the current footprint will remain stable for 2-4 years and a new iteration probably won't change things too drastically. The basic infrastructure for the OS is standard however, which is key. In Linux, even the method for getting packages into the OS varies by distribution. Mix in new window managers, File managers, etc, and it just becomes too much to bother with.
I really wish Google had kept a sterner hand at the keel for Android standards. A well polished infrastructure to assist handset vendors in get-current-stay-current would have been a good start. Instead it seems they just throw it at the wall and sometimes it sticks. Sometimes you can be a little TOO wild west, to the point where it becomes detrimental (IE6 is a good example of that) where folks stray to much from a standard and the developer and the end users pay the price.
And therein lies your problem. As a developer, you most likely don't understand what works for an end user. Linux and the 'year of the desktop' is a perfect example of Linux Developer esthetics. Although they have made great strides over the years, they aren't keeping up on many areas, and Linux remains a small niche product, free though it may be.
A developer can create a truly beautiful technical piece of coding wizardry, but when it comes to design esthetics, they usually suck ass, not to put too fine a point on it. To compound the matter, they will become overly defensive when their design choices are questioned. Too many see it as a personal attack, either on their own design choices, or the platform in general. The blogs and support forums are full of such discourse.
"Why would you ever want to do such a thing..it's stupid"
"Did you even open a terminal and READ the MAN page?"
"Because it's easier this way"
"Your a dumbass. This is the proper way and if you would only stop to think..."
I had a project a few years ago to design a service request system for our end users. I was paired with a business representative to make sure their needs were represented. I hated that woman for the first month. The inane requests for 'features' was astounding and neverending, but in the end, they are the folks who 'use' it and design choices should reflect their needs, not what you think their needs are. It was a painful lesson in more ways than one.
Tragedy? Perhaps the things that you believe are so crucial are just not important in the larger scheme of things. Did you ever stop to think that perhaps you are the fringe element and mainstream simply doesn't care that they can't install some random app from some random developer? A quarter of a million apps does a lot to allay fears of a 'restrictive' platform. Linux is totally free and open, yet it too struggles with mainstream acceptance. Did you ever stop to wonder if perhaps being open and free wasn't all that's needed for success? If it's obviously not working there, why would you expect it to a shoe-in for some other platform?
A Tragedy? Hardly. A tragedy was 9/11. This is just inconvenient to geeks and business as usual for businesses. For iJoe, it's all irrelevant.
The bug is specific to Chrome. I thought it was specific to the OS X build. A simple workaround is to simply launch another browser to post with as the bug doesn't affect Firefox or Safari. I didn't stoop to trying IE though.
Still very irritating...
Well said. The knee-jerk reactions in here aside, parents have always tried and partially succeeded in controlling what their children see and hear. It is as much a part of parenting as feeding and clothing them. The electronic age took a huge chunk of control away from parents. Prior to wide availability of the internet, a child's exposure to such was limited to the occasional glimpse in a porn magazine, and what passed for risque on TV. When web sites started hitting wider audiences, early sites even had to opt into warning people that they were going to see something for adults. Much of it is still setup in such a self policing manner and of course the viewer can still ignore the warning.
I don't think anyone is claiming a parent can control a child 24x7, but it is certainly necessary to ensure they follow the rules and aren't exposed to things the parents don't want them to see. The way people in here are speaking, you would think parents might as well hand them a dvd of 2 Girls 1 Cup now to spare them the shock of seeing it when they are 18.
In the end, it's really no ones business but the parents as to how far they go to control their own children.
More likely it made news because it doesn't have to be some certified or confirmed event to be newsworthy. Don't' forget we use a mod system for a story to even get this far to begin with. Obviously it is of interest to a large number of folks. As news sites go, I prefer this method as we essentially choose our own headlines. If only 'certified' events, known facts, and 'proven' theories (is there such a thing?) made news, we wouldn't have much left to talk about and we would hear about them after the fact more likely as not. I come here for such news, be it from Linux, OS X, Windows, potential future gadgets, random tech talk, or whatever. The day that Apple news is no longer news for nerds is the day /. has lost it's way. It is as much a part of nerd history as Linux, Unix, Windows and everything else PC.
I find it interesting that the Apple haters are whining (aren't they always?) about an Apple story being posted, yet they are silent when a story about 'potential' Android developers 2-3 years from now isn't even blinked at. A bit of a double standard there don't you think? I personally consider such conjecture news as well, even about an android story even though I don't own any of those devices. Surprise, not everyone is a fanatic to the point where we can't stomach hearing about news from either 'camp'. If someone's dislike of a company is getting so extreme that they can't stomach even hearing said company's name, perhaps it's time to take a break away from the PC and a few internet blogs.
This site encompasses more than just a singular personal pronoun.
Last but not least, if they didn't want to hear such stories, why oh why do they always flock in droves to read and then comment on them?
Same here. Although I primarily use Plex for media, netflix, hulu, etc. It will re-encode MP4 audio on the fly to AC3 for those external tuners, supports Lanczos3 for resizing on those big TV's, and it plays pretty much anything you throw at it.
I did a little surgery on the drive bay so that I could cram a 1 GB drive in there (takes a bit of chopping at the plastic bits to make the 12.5 mm fit) but it makes a fine HTPC. It also comes with a built in SPIDF which is nice. All it required was a DVI to HDMI cable, and a TOSLINK cable that I picked up for about $2 bucks.
http://www.amazon.com/6ft-Toslink-Mini-Cable/dp/B000FMXKC8
Didn't apple put one of those out a few years ago? You tilted it on it's axis to get a landscape or portrait view?
As to the general discussion at hand, I just buy a higher res monitor. For example, my new iMac comes with a 16:9 monitor (2560 x 1440) where the old 24" was 16:10. From my perspective, going from a 16:10 24" display at 1920 x 1200 to a higher res of 2560 x 1440 is a logic step, even taking the wider aspect into account.
In short, stop buying displays with low resolutions.
I find it funny that everyone is now out to defend torrents since Apple opted now to allow torrent software, yet they despise DRM on games, which is primarily a direct result of copyright infringement. Before the internet was largely available, copyright protection was basically very simple with little dongles, or bad tracks on a CD or floppy to prevent casual copying. When online sharing became common, the DRM went out of control as a result.
It's difficult in my mind to defend torrents knowing that it's probably realistic that more people use them to infringe copyrights then they do for legal content, especially since the folks who infringe are probably the same ones that cause me a ton of grief with the current DRM schemes in use.
Strangely circular karma ;)
Here in the U.S., the population is rife with people who abuse social services to the tune of billions of dollars a year and then turn around and throw the 'big socialism' boogeyman on the cross when they need to win an election.
From TFA:
This man deserved what he got. He isn't terminally ill. he isn't poor or on welfare. He as much as admits he's just stupid.
And that in turn is why people abuse the current system. They know the billing will be 'sorted out later' and then never pay it. The taxpayer picks up the tab, which I would imagine is what would happen if the fire service had put out this guy's house fire. At that point it already cost far more than $75 dollars.
You don't pay taxes in Europe? You pay for it whether you realize it or not. In this case, this individual is in a separate county, so his taxes did not pay for that service. He is frankly no eligible to receive those services if he didn't pay for them.
As for me, I would never be so stupid as to refuse to pay a $75 dollar fee for fire service.
An interesting sub-topic to be sure. Do you think he had the right to expect those services to be available to him knowing that he refused to pay into the system? I wasn't referring to the larger question of the legality of Health Care and I don't want to get too side tracked from the topic at hand with such. I was more interested in the fact that he refused to pay for the service and then expected them to provide such services for the original fee after it became an emergency.
I see that as very similar to folks who refuse to pay for health insurance, and then expect to be able to go to the emergency room for treatment. It just struck me as a little too close in general situation to the health care debate.
Apologies if I didn't make that clear.
Why does this remind me of the health care argument? People claiming that this sort of things is optional and they shouldn't have to pay, knowing in their minds that it's only a matter of time before they DO need to rely on that service. I have no sympathy for this family. They should have been responsible citizens and paid their dues just like everyone else, instead of assuming they could freeload off the system in an emergency.
My thoughts exactly. This reminds me of 'Pre-N' wireless, which took far too long to ratify a standard that was already in wide use. They sat on their asses so long, it became a joke in the industry. If the governing body takes this long to certify it and they are claiming 'years' more in the future before the standard is finalized, then something is broken. This smacks of Google's 'beta' status. Eventually you have to shit and get off the pot.
Essentially they just need to finalize it, and for those bits that aren't production ready, defer them to HTML6.
There are also theories that without the moon, the earth would wobble uncontrollably with no set axis. Imagine the chaos is that turned out to be true ;)
There's also an error in the summary. TFA states the planet actually has 3 earth masses not 20% to 50% of Earth's mass, which makes sense. It's also tide locked like our moon is to Earth.
Exactly how is what Apple doing anti-competitive?
The only people this ban on core functionality harms is a developer who chooses to delve into those areas. They could also go to any number of other smartphone manufacturer's, who are far larger than apple. It is not anti-competitive under the definition of the law. Even Android keeps some core functions closed.
You're confusing Core Apps with Core Functionality. A calculator is not what I would consider a core function of a smartphone, and neither is a clock or a voice recorder. Calendar (PIM)'s can have a vast array of choices and functions that a basic calendar does not deliver, and I'm betting that Apple doesn't consider a basic calendar db that holds dates core functionality either.
Sure it's a decent number of apps given that there is something like a quater of a million apps, but its a small percent of the whole. These are also folks that broke the rules, not some innocent victim. Yes there are rare cases where an app is rejected for stupid reasons, but those reasons were spelled out in the dev agreement.
The sense of entitlement of some people these days is amazing. They agreed to the developer agreement, willfully break it, and then act shocked when they get their hand slapped. Then people come in here and say it's a 'HUGE' problem, knowing you created the problem. I hate to break it to you, but this is how business works. You don't get to write your own rules FOSS style when contracting with another business. The developer agreement is a legal agreement. You dont' get to change the rules on a whim. Shocking, I know.
I'm not surprised violations get through. There are over 200,000 apps in the store. When they find them, they remove them.
[Citation Needed]
There are, what, 12 core apps, each pretty specific in the function it performs. Apparently there are at least 200,000 other things you can do on the platform without bumping into that functionality. It doesn't seem that hard.
95% are compliant. Of the 5% that aren't, most knowingly broke the rules themselves. The others chose to delve into areas that are open to the whim of personal opinion, such as adult material, or 'obscene'. Guess what? If you design an little sticky notes app, chances are pretty rock solid it won't get banned for being obscene.
This isn't rocket science. Something those dev's who raked in a billion in cash have figured out. Don't try to cheat the system and you'll do fine. If you realize you can't pass up the chance to cheat it, then iOS is not for you.
It's really just that simple.
You do realize that Apple has paid out over a billion dollars to developers? I always enjoy these off the cuff statemetns about how poorly Apple Developers are treated when the simple fact is, that it is a lucrative market, which is why 3 of 4 still plan to develop for it in the immediate future. (ref: http://news.cnet.com/8301-31021_3-20007010-260.html)
Assuming they create a good product, they are treated very well, getting an instant distribution model that functions at break even. Not a bad deal at all.
The simple fact is that a huge majority of apps are approved within 2 weeks. Of those that are rejected, almost unilaterally they violated the developer agreement, and then complain about it after the fact. Google Voice was a good example. At the time it was developed, it offered unlimited texting, which duplicated core functionality, which of course is listed in black in white the agreement.
I know it's popular to love to hate Apple lately, but the simple fact is that the majority of apps are rejected because the developer took a chance and ignored the agreement. I will grant that some of these rejections seem a bit stupid.
Given that 95% percent are accepted without any issue at all, leaving only 5% of questionable apps, the argument that Apple is rejecting apps willy nilly is not exactly a good reflection of reality.
That is the point. If you did a search for video ipod, you may end up with hits on video pod as well. In addition, if you are presented with a list of 10 products, and one of them looks and sounds familiar, you may be more likely to choose the one more familiar to you (this effect is also common during voting season when choosing names from a list. People are more comfortable with the 'familiar').
If a company purposely names their product similarly to another product, with the intent to profit off of that similarity, then it meets the basic definition of trademark infringement.
The two products do NOT have to be the same in form or function. This seems to be where many people get confused about trademarks. Although the more common infringement cases revolve around similar or identical products, that is not always the case.
I doubt Apple will pursue the 'similar products' tack as it doesn't seem like a strong case. Although both devices present video the consumer, they would be difficult to confuse. I believe they will most likely pursue this on the 'branding' side of things, which has no requirement that products are similar.
Ref: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Trademark_infringement
Irrelevant if Apple was the one to trademark 'iPod' with their media player, and they made it a common household name. Showing a reference to a word in a dictionary isn't going to get this start-up anywhere either. No one said that using the word 'pod' is a trademark violation, and it doesn't meet the definition of a trademark infringement.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Trademark_infringement
The fact that they have a media projector called a 'Video Pod' makes the case relevant as it takes on a whole new meaning.
In this case, I think it's justified. Using a media device called a Video Pod could indeed be confused with the Apple Trademark, which is the entire point of a trademark. Words such as Podium wouldn't be of course, but in this case, I would think it's warranted.
If Apple were to release some new gadget and call it "iDroid", you can bet Google would be all over their ass, and with good reason. Borrowing another's trademark with the intent to leverage another's success is a perfect example of trademark infringement.
Informative AND funny first post, and on a Monday morning no less.
Has hell frozen over?
For a home user, not a big deal. For an business environment, much more so. Dismissing it as 'nothing to see' is shortsighted at best, especially when considering the backdoor left by the hack.