Who payed for Kepler? This isn't Schrodinger's Cat. Information can most certainly be 'owned', traded, or sold. Got Spam? Exactly...
If these guys won't release the data due to concerns that they won't spot the next 'earth-like planet' and claim the 'credit', then there are probably thousands who would eagerly take that chance. At this point, it comes down to someone simply evaluating the data. The 'discovery' has already been made in a manner of speaking, so now it's turned into some sort of ugly 'wheres Waldo'.
So instead, he's going to punish the users of XP? At what point does it stop becoming a 'good deed' and start becoming retribution. Hell, even the summary hints as much, and it's very hard NOT to look at it as such, with the users paying the bulk of the price. People on here should know that patching a system as complex as an OS can't be done on a whim. I don't know how many times I've 'fixed' something, only to have it bite me in the ass in some seemingly unrelated function.
No, so you can watch the entire game without a beehive buzzing in your ear. Come to think of it, this will probably resolve on it's own via the advertisers. When they figure out everyone is muting the game, and no one can hear their ads as a result, you can bet pressure will be applied on the stadiums to ban them. Although there may be thousands who go to the game to watch, there are millions made on commercials from the millions of viewers who catch the game on TV.
Cheers and yelling add to the excitement. These plastic toys just add to the irritation. I had to listen to a segment this morning just talking about it, and was forced to mute the volume it was so grating. Easier to just ban the damn things and then they can go 'unfiltered'.
You're not thinking of the potential profits. Now they can charge a per person license just to watch TV. From TFA:
"Various companies have shown off 3D displays that don't require glasses, but those sets often use lenticular lenses, which are integrated into the display and project different images in two fixed directions. As a result, the viewer needs to be in a designated zone to experience 3D. Microsoft's prototype display, however, can deliver 3D video to two viewers at the same time by presenting different images to their left and right eyes (one video for each), regardless of where they are. It can also show ordinary 2D video for up to four people simultaneously (one video for each person)."
A) They didn't need to download 114,000 e-mail addresses to prove it could be done. A handful would have been more than sufficient, or even a simple description of what to do to reproduce the exposure.
B) No they didn't warn AT&T. AT&T and Goatse both stated that Goatse never tried to contact them.
C) This one is True at least
They entered into AT&T's network, uninvited (unless you can find somewhere where AT&T gave them procedures on how to send spoofed IMSI's to the script), and basically attacked their network.
The proper course would have been to provide AT&T with information about the exposure. They should have destroyed all data recovered rather than forwarding it on to someone else.
I have to agree with the parent. It's pointless to 'go back to the moon' unless there is actually something to be done. Just doing something 'because we can' is pointless and doesn't advance science in any way. Private industry can advance rocket technology faster than NASA if they find incentive to do so. Since they have verified water on the moon, there appears to be some incentive, but just showing up for some pissing match that we already won is stupid. I agree a permanent base on the moon would be ideal, but I just don't see that happening in the next decade or two. I do see it becoming more realistic in the next 50 years or so as we become more efficient in both robotics, solar power solutions, and potentially in propulsion techs as well.
Ideas that we will unleash our robotic army to build a base station there are also just fantasy. We lack the technology to deploy such a mechanical fleet. Our robotics are limited to a solar powered buggy with some minimalistic sensors, a saw, and an easy-bake oven. Hardly the stuff that SciFi is made of.
Lets all try to be a bit more realistic here. Leave it to private industry to catch up and surpass what NASA did. They've had 50 years to come up with a better rocket. All they've done is refine what we have.
Since not a single individual can point to a policy (from Apple), and the 'source' was some 'forum', and the store doing these illegal sales claimed that (and more) about required accessories, I would tend to think the local sales manager and/or sales staff are simply padding their sales numbers.
Which is more believable: A very public (and image aware) company with a hidden policy that all retail stores who sell iPads MUST sell iPads with accessories. A policy which is apparently ignored at every other retain chain in the world, or some bad Apples (no pun intended) in a retail chain in Australia, that is breaking the rules, since their own corporate office even refuses to admit their company would endorse such a policy.
I know the Apple haters love to look for dirt, but the only place it's going to stick in this case, is on the retain chain. The retail chain corporate office is even stating it's probably just some overzealous staff.
From TFA:
"A Telstra spokesman confirmed last night that the carrier has no agreement in place with any reseller to push SIM cards to iPad buyers.
“The iPad is definitely not locked to Telstra and shouldn’t be sold on that basis,” he said adding Telstra has asked the store chain to look into the claims.
The practice is not sanctioned by Apple either. An Apple spokeswoman said while she could not comment on company policy, “consumers could buy iPads directly from us” without any add-ons.
Late on Friday, JB Hi-Fi’s newly installed chief executive Terry Smart told the Herald the sale tactic was not company policy “in any way shape or form”.
He said it may have been one isolated store in NSW, but admitted he was concerned there had been multiple complaints on the forum. He could not say if it was the action of a few over-zealous sales staff.
“We’ve addressed it with Warrawong and told them it’s not our policy.”
Smart said JB Hi-Fi stores would refund any device or accessory which shoppers believed had been bought under pressure.
“We will do whatever is required. We fully understand our obligations under the Trade Practices Act,’ Smart said."
I would imagine that they are probably in a legal contract. AT&T was the only provider that would event talk to Apple when they went around to each peddling the iPhone.
I imagine AT&T got a pretty good deal including this exclusivity deal. It makes no logical sense for Apple to want to stay with AT&T. It limits their customer base with arguably the worst of the big three, and by extension, limits their growth. I think it's more of a 'they have to".
I don't think that's a valid comparison. We all know what data theft is. These e-mail addresses were not sitting in some text file on the server in plain sight. The Goatse folks specifically had to send formatted data to an undocumented script to get it to return an address. I don't equate that with 'the address was written in big letters on the door'.
Apple doesn't really matter in the equation at all. AT&T has a responsibility to secure users personal information due to privacy laws. It really doesn't matter who gave them that information, they are legally bound to secure it. When users purchased a 3G contract WITH AT&T, they signed the agreement with AT&T as to what was allowed. I know the Apple haters are all excited, but they always gloss over that point. Apple doesn't sell 3G access. AT&T does, and the user goes into the contract directly with AT&T, NOT Apple.
Apple is not a police force. The FBI was called in for this purpose. Apple has no authority to inspect AT&T's servers, data, or anything of the sort. They can demand certain contractual obligations, but that doesn't mean AT&T will simply open it's doors and allow Apple free feign to it's data centers.
At some point, AT&T has to comply with local and federal laws regarding data and privacy. They failed to do so.
I'm of two minds about the Goatse folks being accountable. You could argue that they knew they were exploiting a weakness each time they sent this script the device ID's, but in their defense, it's rational to ask what kind of brain dead person would drop a script into the public domain knowing the information it could return while not securing said script?
I think I would have to take the 'open garage door' approach. Although someone may leave their garage door open, it is not an open invitation to walk in and steal something, tempting though it might be to some. Unless AT&T published information which led Goatse to believe they were invited or authorized into the AT&T's servers to retrieve that information, I would still have to consider what they did 'hacking' in a very basic sense.
Google is not an 'open source company', although they do have open source products. Even Microsoft has open source initiatives (granted theirs is rather pitiful), as does Apple (apple tends to release far more to the open source community and open standards of the two however). Google get's it's revenue from web ads, and unless they open the source code and algorithms for the web their proprietary web search, they are not an Open Source company. Projects like Chrome, and Android don't make them any money.
"Built on their multiple open source projects. I say.. they ARE their bottom line."
I find it funny that you mention "Bottom Line" when neither of those adds to their bottom line.
Isn't the burden of proof on the government in this case? How would they prove (without access records), the last time you accessed a device they themselves wanted access to? I wonder how often this is enforced. We haven't quite gotten that bad in the U.S. yet. I think what their trying to pass in Australia is a bit more difficult, simply because all people are two faced. They may clamor about saving the children, and actually believe that, but at home, they are watching scat porn, roman showers, and even some kinky shit. People are curious by nature, and I would challenge most adults have looked at porn or some other content that would be frowned on. They know this, even if they won't admit it.
How long will this Conroy douche be around anyway?
They had a year to read it, and many of them bet their jobs on it. They read it. If I gave you a 1 page book, which you read, and then added a page a day, would you be able to keep up? Of course.
The Congressional Budget Office reviewed the bill for impact:
The Congressional Budget Office (CBO) is a federal agency within the legislative branch of the United States government. It is a government agency that provides economic data to Congress.[1] The CBO was created as an independent nonpartisan agency by the Congressional Budget and Impoundment Control Act of 1974.
It is not their job to 'take sides', or to push an agenda. Their only purpose is to evaluate costs as it affects the budge, congress, or the nation in general. Whether congress follows those recommendations is another matter.
"On March 20, 2010, CBO released its final cost estimate for the reconciliation act, which encompassed the effects of both pieces of legislation. Table 1 (on page 5) provides a broad summary and Table 2 offers a detailed breakdown of the budgetary effects of the two pieces of legislation. CBO and the staff of the Joint Committee on Taxation (JCT) estimate that enacting both pieces of legislation will produce a net reduction in federal deficits of $143 billion over the 2010-2019 period. About $124 billion of that savings stems from provisions dealing with health care and federal revenues; the other $19 billion results from the education provisions. Those figures do not include potential costs that would be funded through future appropriations (those are discussed on pages 10-11 of the cost estimate)."
And yet the very fact that Android is thriving pretty much nullifies any argument that there is anti-competitive behavior on the part of Apple. Either that or Apple is very bad at it, which would make the behavior irrelevant.
Apple doesn't have to let Android run on it's hardware. They have a closed system, no different than your router, your microwave, or your cable box. They don't have to allow Google ads on their hardware. They don't have to allow developers free reign on their hardware. None of those actions are illegal because they do not have a monopoly.
Android compete's just fine against it as evidenced by their rapid climb into significance. It is not anti-competitive behavior.
I don't know if I would call them journalists: Title: Apple's Worst Security Breach "Apple has suffered another embarrassment. A security breach has exposed iPad owners including dozens of CEOs, military officials, and top politicians. They—and every other buyer of the cellular-enabled tablet—could be vulnerable to spam marketing and malicious hacking."
This is squarely AT&T's fault, yet the first paragraph implies it was "Apple Worst Security Breach". I also like how they imply that a spammer getting your e-mail address is the be-all-end-all of hacking. Really? These folks have never seen spam before? How will they venture out onto the internet without feeling exposed and dirty? Oh wait. They get a new e-mail address. *sigh*
You don't think that any of the reasons you mentioned might be a factor? None of which have anything to do with being 'open' in any real sense?
"The reason Android is succeeding is that it's an open ecosystem - it's on lots of different phones, from lots of manufacturers, running on all the different GSM and CDMA networks in the US. There are entry level Android phones for Joe "Cheapskates" Average who just wants apps on a cheap phone, and power-user smartphones like the Evo 4G and Nexus One."
I see the android line being successful because it's very much an iPhone 'killer', or at least in the same game anyway, it's cheap, and you can buy it from tons of different places. The iPhone is limited to a single carrier, with a single 'current' model, and a single hardware vendor. If/when Apple makes the leap to the other providers, I think all bets are off.
As to a "*ton*" of apps being blocked (your words, not mine), I think you are overestimating. I can think of a few, like Skype (although it's available now), Google Maps, but they decided NOT to release it on iPhone. I'm sure there was another high profile app, but I can't recall what it was. Per the Apple line, they approve 95% of the apps submitted within 7 day. The remaining 5 percent are blocked due to:
1) Crashing 2) Use of private API's in violation with the developer agreement 3) Doesn't do what the designer said it would do 4) Banned content as laid out in the develop agreement
I suspect #1 and #2 are the biggies, after all, when someone gets blocked, do you think they would go out and tell the world that Apple thought their app was shitty because it crashed all the time? Would they also admit they violated their agreement, knowing they would get caught, and then expect them to admit any wrongdoing? Far easier to simply claim it was blocked due to some conspiracy by the evil corporation. It certainly seems to work here, as Apple doesn't care about the 'geek' crowd. I can actually understand the anger. We used to set the trend, and in this arena, we simply don't matter, but I don't have such a hard time with the idea.
You mention a small list of apps that were blocked, and then admit that they already match built in functionality. It's not as if people are being denied basic service here. They just don't care. The mail app works fine. So does SMS. Flash isn't on any phone right now in any stable, usable way. It's irrelevant. Game emulators? Do you realize the sheer number of games that are available on the iPhone?
Apple paid out 1 Billion dollars to developers. The system works, it's lucrative, assuming you write a solid app that is desirable, and doesn't crash. I for one actually find comfort in the fact that an app that I pay for will do what it says, it's been scanned for malicious intent, it will be relatively stable. Given the crowd in here, I would think a fair number could appreciate those standards. Then again, perhaps not.
Probably one of the more insightful and 'sane' comments I've seen on Apple in a very long while. Unfortunately, the will mod you down as 'troll' or 'flamebait' when you actually make very good arguments. The anti-Apple crowd in here has turned into THE definition of a fanboi (read: irrational), only they don't realize or refuse to see how irrational some of the arguments used have become.
I'm nearsighted, and have been all my life. I find it amazing that this 318 PPI display will look like 'crap' when I've been using 90-120 PPI monitors all my life, and none of them looked like 'crap' once they got past the old VGA standard. This whole argument is ridiculous. I don't see the Android folks in here defending their displays because they must also look like 'crap', since all of them are a lower pixel density than the iPhone and they use a sub-quality PenTile Matrix display on top of that. Where is the outrage?
I'm looking at a 27" display at a distance of about 18", and it has a PPI of something like 208. I can't see any individual pixels, nor could I on my older 150 PPI monitor. This whole argument that it will look like shit is patently stupid not to put too fine a point on it.
What the hell happened to slashdot. I used to expect intelligent discussion in here but not it's gotten so bad with rhetoric and 'taking sides' that facts and logic have become meaningless. I keep wondering when Engadget took over the./ domain.
And if they do that, there is a provision in the bill that they get no access to any of the millions of new customers if they are found to be gouging. Would you purposely chop of your own hand and risk losing access to a pool of millions of customers? There are protections against those very practices written into the bill.
We are already paying for the uninsured. We have been for years. This will at least force them to take some personal responsibility. If they can't afford it (as you have indicated you can't afford it now), you certainly won't be paying $900 dollars in fines. You will receive subsidies to cover the cost, assuming you're not just blowing political rhetoric up everyone's bum and you actually do make less than the cutoff. The truth is that people who have coverage through their jobs, won't even notice much of a change except they will not have to face 'maximum coverage' clauses and 'lifetime benefit' clauses that allow the insurance companies to weasel out of their obligations.
There is a very real and obvious reason that insurance will pay for preventative care today, even when there is nothing immediately wrong with the patient. They know in the end it saves them costs, which is why they offer free or very low cost visits for such care. This bill will achieve that on a massive scale. People who are not currently insured and who would never seek preventative care can do so, and hopefully avoid catastrophic costs later on.
Considering a bi-partisan budget panel reviewed the legislation and came to the agreement that it would indeed save costs, you'll forgive me if I take their answer with a bit more credibility that your claims that it will "will just make it worse", , well, just because...
I might point out that a monopoly in and of itself is not 'illegal'. It requires a monopoly and intent to use that to a competitors disadvantage (anti-competitive).
Two things to point out. 1) The smartphone market is alive and thriving. The fact that droid could launch in what, 2008 and become a major albeit smaller competitor in 2 years time indicates there is a very health smartphone market out there 2) The very fact that AdMob exists on that same thriving market by a competing platform outside of Apple's umbrella, and utilized by far more hardware vendors that Apple alone would mitigate these claims somewhat.
I simply see this as a pissing content between Apple and Google. In other words: "Competitor dislikes other competitors. Film at 11..."
Slashdot Mirror
Who payed for Kepler? This isn't Schrodinger's Cat. Information can most certainly be 'owned', traded, or sold. Got Spam? Exactly...
If these guys won't release the data due to concerns that they won't spot the next 'earth-like planet' and claim the 'credit', then there are probably thousands who would eagerly take that chance. At this point, it comes down to someone simply evaluating the data. The 'discovery' has already been made in a manner of speaking, so now it's turned into some sort of ugly 'wheres Waldo'.
So instead, he's going to punish the users of XP? At what point does it stop becoming a 'good deed' and start becoming retribution. Hell, even the summary hints as much, and it's very hard NOT to look at it as such, with the users paying the bulk of the price. People on here should know that patching a system as complex as an OS can't be done on a whim. I don't know how many times I've 'fixed' something, only to have it bite me in the ass in some seemingly unrelated function.
No, so you can watch the entire game without a beehive buzzing in your ear. Come to think of it, this will probably resolve on it's own via the advertisers. When they figure out everyone is muting the game, and no one can hear their ads as a result, you can bet pressure will be applied on the stadiums to ban them. Although there may be thousands who go to the game to watch, there are millions made on commercials from the millions of viewers who catch the game on TV.
Cheers and yelling add to the excitement. These plastic toys just add to the irritation. I had to listen to a segment this morning just talking about it, and was forced to mute the volume it was so grating. Easier to just ban the damn things and then they can go 'unfiltered'.
You're not thinking of the potential profits. Now they can charge a per person license just to watch TV. From TFA:
"Various companies have shown off 3D displays that don't require glasses, but those sets often use lenticular lenses, which are integrated into the display and project different images in two fixed directions. As a result, the viewer needs to be in a designated zone to experience 3D. Microsoft's prototype display, however, can deliver 3D video to two viewers at the same time by presenting different images to their left and right eyes (one video for each), regardless of where they are. It can also show ordinary 2D video for up to four people simultaneously (one video for each person)."
A) They didn't need to download 114,000 e-mail addresses to prove it could be done. A handful would have been more than sufficient, or even a simple description of what to do to reproduce the exposure.
B) No they didn't warn AT&T. AT&T and Goatse both stated that Goatse never tried to contact them.
C) This one is True at least
They entered into AT&T's network, uninvited (unless you can find somewhere where AT&T gave them procedures on how to send spoofed IMSI's to the script), and basically attacked their network.
The proper course would have been to provide AT&T with information about the exposure. They should have destroyed all data recovered rather than forwarding it on to someone else.
I have to agree with the parent. It's pointless to 'go back to the moon' unless there is actually something to be done. Just doing something 'because we can' is pointless and doesn't advance science in any way. Private industry can advance rocket technology faster than NASA if they find incentive to do so. Since they have verified water on the moon, there appears to be some incentive, but just showing up for some pissing match that we already won is stupid. I agree a permanent base on the moon would be ideal, but I just don't see that happening in the next decade or two. I do see it becoming more realistic in the next 50 years or so as we become more efficient in both robotics, solar power solutions, and potentially in propulsion techs as well.
Ideas that we will unleash our robotic army to build a base station there are also just fantasy. We lack the technology to deploy such a mechanical fleet. Our robotics are limited to a solar powered buggy with some minimalistic sensors, a saw, and an easy-bake oven. Hardly the stuff that SciFi is made of.
Lets all try to be a bit more realistic here. Leave it to private industry to catch up and surpass what NASA did. They've had 50 years to come up with a better rocket. All they've done is refine what we have.
Since not a single individual can point to a policy (from Apple), and the 'source' was some 'forum', and the store doing these illegal sales claimed that (and more) about required accessories, I would tend to think the local sales manager and/or sales staff are simply padding their sales numbers.
Which is more believable: A very public (and image aware) company with a hidden policy that all retail stores who sell iPads MUST sell iPads with accessories. A policy which is apparently ignored at every other retain chain in the world, or some bad Apples (no pun intended) in a retail chain in Australia, that is breaking the rules, since their own corporate office even refuses to admit their company would endorse such a policy.
I know the Apple haters love to look for dirt, but the only place it's going to stick in this case, is on the retain chain. The retail chain corporate office is even stating it's probably just some overzealous staff.
From TFA:
"A Telstra spokesman confirmed last night that the carrier has no agreement in place with any reseller to push SIM cards to iPad buyers.
“The iPad is definitely not locked to Telstra and shouldn’t be sold on that basis,” he said adding Telstra has asked the store chain to look into the claims.
The practice is not sanctioned by Apple either. An Apple spokeswoman said while she could not comment on company policy, “consumers could buy iPads directly from us” without any add-ons.
Late on Friday, JB Hi-Fi’s newly installed chief executive Terry Smart told the Herald the sale tactic was not company policy “in any way shape or form”.
He said it may have been one isolated store in NSW, but admitted he was concerned there had been multiple complaints on the forum. He could not say if it was the action of a few over-zealous sales staff.
“We’ve addressed it with Warrawong and told them it’s not our policy.”
Smart said JB Hi-Fi stores would refund any device or accessory which shoppers believed had been bought under pressure.
“We will do whatever is required. We fully understand our obligations under the Trade Practices Act,’ Smart said."
I would imagine that they are probably in a legal contract. AT&T was the only provider that would event talk to Apple when they went around to each peddling the iPhone.
I imagine AT&T got a pretty good deal including this exclusivity deal. It makes no logical sense for Apple to want to stay with AT&T. It limits their customer base with arguably the worst of the big three, and by extension, limits their growth. I think it's more of a 'they have to".
I don't think that's a valid comparison. We all know what data theft is. These e-mail addresses were not sitting in some text file on the server in plain sight. The Goatse folks specifically had to send formatted data to an undocumented script to get it to return an address. I don't equate that with 'the address was written in big letters on the door'.
Apple doesn't really matter in the equation at all. AT&T has a responsibility to secure users personal information due to privacy laws. It really doesn't matter who gave them that information, they are legally bound to secure it. When users purchased a 3G contract WITH AT&T, they signed the agreement with AT&T as to what was allowed. I know the Apple haters are all excited, but they always gloss over that point. Apple doesn't sell 3G access. AT&T does, and the user goes into the contract directly with AT&T, NOT Apple.
Apple is not a police force. The FBI was called in for this purpose. Apple has no authority to inspect AT&T's servers, data, or anything of the sort. They can demand certain contractual obligations, but that doesn't mean AT&T will simply open it's doors and allow Apple free feign to it's data centers.
At some point, AT&T has to comply with local and federal laws regarding data and privacy. They failed to do so.
I'm of two minds about the Goatse folks being accountable. You could argue that they knew they were exploiting a weakness each time they sent this script the device ID's, but in their defense, it's rational to ask what kind of brain dead person would drop a script into the public domain knowing the information it could return while not securing said script?
I think I would have to take the 'open garage door' approach. Although someone may leave their garage door open, it is not an open invitation to walk in and steal something, tempting though it might be to some. Unless AT&T published information which led Goatse to believe they were invited or authorized into the AT&T's servers to retrieve that information, I would still have to consider what they did 'hacking' in a very basic sense.
Google is not an 'open source company', although they do have open source products. Even Microsoft has open source initiatives (granted theirs is rather pitiful), as does Apple (apple tends to release far more to the open source community and open standards of the two however). Google get's it's revenue from web ads, and unless they open the source code and algorithms for the web their proprietary web search, they are not an Open Source company. Projects like Chrome, and Android don't make them any money.
"Built on their multiple open source projects. I say.. they ARE their bottom line."
I find it funny that you mention "Bottom Line" when neither of those adds to their bottom line.
Isn't the burden of proof on the government in this case? How would they prove (without access records), the last time you accessed a device they themselves wanted access to? I wonder how often this is enforced. We haven't quite gotten that bad in the U.S. yet. I think what their trying to pass in Australia is a bit more difficult, simply because all people are two faced. They may clamor about saving the children, and actually believe that, but at home, they are watching scat porn, roman showers, and even some kinky shit. People are curious by nature, and I would challenge most adults have looked at porn or some other content that would be frowned on. They know this, even if they won't admit it.
How long will this Conroy douche be around anyway?
They had a year to read it, and many of them bet their jobs on it. They read it. If I gave you a 1 page book, which you read, and then added a page a day, would you be able to keep up? Of course.
The Congressional Budget Office reviewed the bill for impact:
The Congressional Budget Office (CBO) is a federal agency within the legislative branch of the United States government. It is a government agency that provides economic data to Congress.[1] The CBO was created as an independent nonpartisan agency by the Congressional Budget and Impoundment Control Act of 1974.
http://www.cbo.gov/publications/collections/health.cfm
It is not their job to 'take sides', or to push an agenda. Their only purpose is to evaluate costs as it affects the budge, congress, or the nation in general. Whether congress follows those recommendations is another matter.
"On March 20, 2010, CBO released its final cost estimate for the reconciliation act, which encompassed the effects of both pieces of legislation. Table 1 (on page 5) provides a broad summary and Table 2 offers a detailed breakdown of the budgetary effects of the two pieces of legislation. CBO and the staff of the Joint Committee on Taxation (JCT) estimate that enacting both pieces of legislation will produce a net reduction in federal deficits of $143 billion over the 2010-2019 period. About $124 billion of that savings stems from provisions dealing with health care and federal revenues; the other $19 billion results from the education provisions. Those figures do not include potential costs that would be funded through future appropriations (those are discussed on pages 10-11 of the cost estimate)."
[Source]
http://www.cbo.gov/publications/collections/health.cfm
And yet the very fact that Android is thriving pretty much nullifies any argument that there is anti-competitive behavior on the part of Apple. Either that or Apple is very bad at it, which would make the behavior irrelevant.
Apple doesn't have to let Android run on it's hardware. They have a closed system, no different than your router, your microwave, or your cable box. They don't have to allow Google ads on their hardware. They don't have to allow developers free reign on their hardware. None of those actions are illegal because they do not have a monopoly.
Android compete's just fine against it as evidenced by their rapid climb into significance. It is not anti-competitive behavior.
It's called competition. There is a difference.
They may have discovered it, but they didn't report it to AT&T. From TFA:
"The person or group who discovered this gap did not contact AT&T."
Not that 'good' in my opinion.
I don't know if I would call them journalists:
Title: Apple's Worst Security Breach
"Apple has suffered another embarrassment. A security breach has exposed iPad owners including dozens of CEOs, military officials, and top politicians. They—and every other buyer of the cellular-enabled tablet—could be vulnerable to spam marketing and malicious hacking."
This is squarely AT&T's fault, yet the first paragraph implies it was "Apple Worst Security Breach". I also like how they imply that a spammer getting your e-mail address is the be-all-end-all of hacking. Really? These folks have never seen spam before? How will they venture out onto the internet without feeling exposed and dirty? Oh wait. They get a new e-mail address. *sigh*
You don't think that any of the reasons you mentioned might be a factor? None of which have anything to do with being 'open' in any real sense?
"The reason Android is succeeding is that it's an open ecosystem - it's on lots of different phones, from lots of manufacturers, running on all the different GSM and CDMA networks in the US. There are entry level Android phones for Joe "Cheapskates" Average who just wants apps on a cheap phone, and power-user smartphones like the Evo 4G and Nexus One."
I see the android line being successful because it's very much an iPhone 'killer', or at least in the same game anyway, it's cheap, and you can buy it from tons of different places. The iPhone is limited to a single carrier, with a single 'current' model, and a single hardware vendor. If/when Apple makes the leap to the other providers, I think all bets are off.
As to a "*ton*" of apps being blocked (your words, not mine), I think you are overestimating. I can think of a few, like Skype (although it's available now), Google Maps, but they decided NOT to release it on iPhone. I'm sure there was another high profile app, but I can't recall what it was. Per the Apple line, they approve 95% of the apps submitted within 7 day. The remaining 5 percent are blocked due to:
1) Crashing
2) Use of private API's in violation with the developer agreement
3) Doesn't do what the designer said it would do
4) Banned content as laid out in the develop agreement
I suspect #1 and #2 are the biggies, after all, when someone gets blocked, do you think they would go out and tell the world that Apple thought their app was shitty because it crashed all the time? Would they also admit they violated their agreement, knowing they would get caught, and then expect them to admit any wrongdoing? Far easier to simply claim it was blocked due to some conspiracy by the evil corporation. It certainly seems to work here, as Apple doesn't care about the 'geek' crowd. I can actually understand the anger. We used to set the trend, and in this arena, we simply don't matter, but I don't have such a hard time with the idea.
You mention a small list of apps that were blocked, and then admit that they already match built in functionality. It's not as if people are being denied basic service here. They just don't care. The mail app works fine. So does SMS. Flash isn't on any phone right now in any stable, usable way. It's irrelevant. Game emulators? Do you realize the sheer number of games that are available on the iPhone?
Apple paid out 1 Billion dollars to developers. The system works, it's lucrative, assuming you write a solid app that is desirable, and doesn't crash. I for one actually find comfort in the fact that an app that I pay for will do what it says, it's been scanned for malicious intent, it will be relatively stable. Given the crowd in here, I would think a fair number could appreciate those standards. Then again, perhaps not.
Probably one of the more insightful and 'sane' comments I've seen on Apple in a very long while. Unfortunately, the will mod you down as 'troll' or 'flamebait' when you actually make very good arguments. The anti-Apple crowd in here has turned into THE definition of a fanboi (read: irrational), only they don't realize or refuse to see how irrational some of the arguments used have become.
I'm nearsighted, and have been all my life. I find it amazing that this 318 PPI display will look like 'crap' when I've been using 90-120 PPI monitors all my life, and none of them looked like 'crap' once they got past the old VGA standard. This whole argument is ridiculous. I don't see the Android folks in here defending their displays because they must also look like 'crap', since all of them are a lower pixel density than the iPhone and they use a sub-quality PenTile Matrix display on top of that. Where is the outrage?
http://arstechnica.com/gadgets/news/2010/03/secrets-of-the-nexus-ones-screen-science-color-and-hacks.ars/
I'm looking at a 27" display at a distance of about 18", and it has a PPI of something like 208. I can't see any individual pixels, nor could I on my older 150 PPI monitor. This whole argument that it will look like shit is patently stupid not to put too fine a point on it.
What the hell happened to slashdot. I used to expect intelligent discussion in here but not it's gotten so bad with rhetoric and 'taking sides' that facts and logic have become meaningless. I keep wondering when Engadget took over the ./ domain.
And if they do that, there is a provision in the bill that they get no access to any of the millions of new customers if they are found to be gouging. Would you purposely chop of your own hand and risk losing access to a pool of millions of customers? There are protections against those very practices written into the bill.
We are already paying for the uninsured. We have been for years. This will at least force them to take some personal responsibility. If they can't afford it (as you have indicated you can't afford it now), you certainly won't be paying $900 dollars in fines. You will receive subsidies to cover the cost, assuming you're not just blowing political rhetoric up everyone's bum and you actually do make less than the cutoff. The truth is that people who have coverage through their jobs, won't even notice much of a change except they will not have to face 'maximum coverage' clauses and 'lifetime benefit' clauses that allow the insurance companies to weasel out of their obligations.
There is a very real and obvious reason that insurance will pay for preventative care today, even when there is nothing immediately wrong with the patient. They know in the end it saves them costs, which is why they offer free or very low cost visits for such care. This bill will achieve that on a massive scale. People who are not currently insured and who would never seek preventative care can do so, and hopefully avoid catastrophic costs later on.
Considering a bi-partisan budget panel reviewed the legislation and came to the agreement that it would indeed save costs, you'll forgive me if I take their answer with a bit more credibility that your claims that it will "will just make it worse", , well, just because...
I might point out that a monopoly in and of itself is not 'illegal'. It requires a monopoly and intent to use that to a competitors disadvantage (anti-competitive).
Two things to point out.
1) The smartphone market is alive and thriving. The fact that droid could launch in what, 2008 and become a major albeit smaller competitor in 2 years time indicates there is a very health smartphone market out there
2) The very fact that AdMob exists on that same thriving market by a competing platform outside of Apple's umbrella, and utilized by far more hardware vendors that Apple alone would mitigate these claims somewhat.
I simply see this as a pissing content between Apple and Google. In other words: "Competitor dislikes other competitors. Film at 11..."
You mean those cards that are $99 dollars, which would put the 32 GB EVO at the same price for the 32 GB iPhone 4?
Plus you also get the bonus of a 256 MB app limit.
Unless you can prove that every iPhone user holds their iPhone at LESS than 18 inches, it's not false advertising.