Agreed. Provided the kid isn't vegetating on it all the time, it adds to the experience of their formative years. A child of that age should be packing in as many experiences as possible - yes this includes outdoor activities, physical activities, mental activities and developing motor skills by manipulating real-world objects, but there's no harm in spending an hour or two clicking around on a computer either.
Admittedly I never had a computer ~of my own~ until 1995, at which point I was 13 years old (I'm 28 now). And what a beast it was: 486 DX4/100, 8MB of RAM (which I upgraded to 16 the next year) and a quad-speed (OMG) CD-ROM. But I did use other people's computers from a very early age. In fact, I started using computers in preschool (Apple IIs, no less), so I would have been around 4 years old at that time. A bit later, aged 7-10 or so, we were given an original IBM AT (completely with clicky keyboard) by my uncle who was upgrading to a 386. I figured out how to use DOS during those years, and by extension, the fundamentals of files, directories and using a CLI to manipulate them. BTW that IBM AT is still down the garage at my parents' place, and still boots fine (DOS 5.x). The hard drive rumbles like thunder but it keeps going - amazing considering the garage is uninsulated and I live in inland Australia where it would be exposed to a range of around -5 C -> 45 C each year (23 F -> 113 F).
Now of course, as a kid, it was mostly games that interested me. I remember spending a lot of time screwing around with autoexec.bat/config.sys/himem.sys/emm386 etc. trying to get more precious conventional memory to run games. But that was educational in itself, and is what got me interested in computers in the first place. It eventually led to an enjoyable career in my adult life, so I don't think it was harmful at all.
The iPad is a 'coffee table' type device. Let's face it, 99% of the time you just want to look something up quickly on a website, or check your mail. Printing is one of those things you only do every now and again. So yes, you go to a 'real computer' to do that. But how often does that happen? I can't remember the last time I actually needed to print something for a non-work purpose (and for work, I'd be using a real computer to begin with).
Noone, even Apple zealots, suggests the iPad is a replacement for an actual computer - that's daft. It's a simple web/media/ebook reading device that you can leave on the coffee table and look stuff up quickly when the need arises. It boots basically instantly and has far longer battery life than any laptop (and some netbooks). If you are the kind of person that always has a real computer powered on and within reach of you, then yeah, iPad is a useless purchase for you. If you print stuff regularly, then iPad is not for you either. But not everyone uses technology the same way...
I don't know why there's this mentality that everyone is either rabidly pro- or anti- iDevice/Apple. Assess each device on its merits and compare with how you as an individual use technology. iDevices are the sweet spot for many people. Personally, I do have an iPhone, but on the other hand all my computers and laptops are PCs and I don't own an iPad. Right now there's no real niche in my life that it would fill since I tend to use my phone for quickly looking things up. Perhaps if I started reading ebooks or watching movies in bed or something I'd get an iPad. If I travelled more the 3G iPad might be good too - it's light and has good battery life, and when you're travelling let's face it, all you really need is web, email and GPS.
Thank you AC. People saying "could care less" when the phrase is actually "couldN'T care less" is my second greatest grammar-Nazi-inducing action. Right behind lose/loose at #1.
I'm in full agreement with your post - Apple products aren't "inferior" unless the only thing that matters to you is performance bang for buck, or sheer number of features. But for many people, these simply AREN'T the things that matter. They are looking for quality, reliabilty and ease of use. But not everyone who buys Apple does so for the same reason.
For me, even though I'm a geek and generally against locked down hardware/software ecosystems, it comes down to hardware quality. How it looks and feels. Simple as that.
Pick up a typical Dell/HP/Asus/Toshiba/etc laptop by a corner. Feel that cheap plastic casing flex under the weight. Hear it creak. Close and open it and feel that cheap plastic clip click into place in a way that lets you just ~know~ it's going to break after a year or two.
Now pick up a Macbook Pro in the same way. It's chalk and cheese. Apple get away with charging 2x what others do for the same specs (CPU, RAM etc) because of various reasons... it's ignorance for some people, true... but I'm as techy as they come and I see the attraction. Solidly built hardware makes a HUGE difference to how people feel about a product and how confident they are in it.
Now because I'm a geek and like to tinker, Apple's relatively locked down ecosystem of products doesn't appeal to me, just like it doesn't appeal to quite a lot of Slashdotters. But for appliance-type objects like a phone, music player, or coffee-table web/ebook reader (i.e. tablet), yes, I choose Apple. I don't care about their performance or the ability to run arbitrary code on these kind of devices. I just want them to work well and not get in the way, and to feel solid and well-built in the hand. When I want to tinker I'll fire up one of my PCs or non-Apple laptops.
Agreed. Having an external antenna wasn't as dumb a decision as people seem to think. By virtue of it, the base level of reception the iPhone 4 receives is BETTER than previous phones with internal antennas. It's only if you mash something conductive (slightly moist hand, for instance) into that gap in the bottom left corner that you see a drop in reception.
Having said that, I have an iPhone 4, don't use a case at all, and have never had a REAL WORLD issue with reception. Yeah ok so if I push my finger into the 'magic spot' I lose a bar or two. But it doesn't have any real world consequences for me, other than some bars on a screen going down. Calls don't drop, data still flows. So I go from 5 bars to 4 or 4 bars to 3, big deal.
But you're right - they should have included a bumper in the box. For someone who lives in an area with very marginal reception (e.g. 1 bar), the antenna can be a problem. The bit of added attenuation added by their hand can take them from 'bad reception' to 'no reception'. It's one of those things that totally depends on where you are, how good your carrier is (remember, outside of America the iPhone isn't tied to a particular carrier, and carriers are NOT created equal as far as network quality and reception go), and how you use your phone (e.g. if you mostly use it for data, it's unlikely the antenna is going to worry you too much since you aren't typically holding it in a way that will cause a problem).
Mostly cause we get 20 days leave a year (legal minimum permitted here) but most of my American side of the family get half of that, if they're lucky. So we can visit them longer than they can visit us. So yeah, there'll be plenty of next times. Yay!
I'm not an American, but my wife is. I therefore enter the US to visit family on a regular basis... over 20 visits in the last decade. The first time I visited was in 2001, prior to 9/11. The change I have seen in US airports in that time is stunning.
I put up with the slower, more detailed bag x-rays. I put up with the taking your shoes off crap (that you don't have to do in any other country). I put up with the dudes at the immigration desk becoming far more threatening and suspicious and just downright rude.
I... reluctantly... put up with the fact that they took first one, then two, and now ALL TEN of my fingerprints on every entry. To put this in perspective, in my country, fingerprints are not used as a form of ID as they seem to be in the US. The only people who have their fingerprints recorded are criminals. So the only people on earth who have a record of my fingerprints are a FOREIGN government (not even my own government has them). Does that seem ridiculous to anyone else? But I digress...
But this year when I entered I had to go through the damn nudie scanners. Now I realised I could opt out, and I did. But as a foreigner, they really gave me the once over. Now let me clarify here - I'm Australian - I speak English, I'm white, I have no criminal record, and I in no way would be considered a 'high risk' profile. But they made it very clear that they didn't want scary foreigners like me opting out of the scanning. And frankly, next trip, I will just go through the damn scanner. The alternative took ten times longer and was far more invasive and left me with a bad impression of the US as a whole. I thought the fingerprinting was the final straw for me but no, this is ridiculous.
So yes, the TSA is terrifying. They make the alternatives to the scanner very unattractive due to the lost time and increased questioning. So people 'preferring the scanner' is not because the like the idea. It's just the lesser of two evils.
It's a real shame - I love visiting the US. For all it's flaws it's a fascinating country. But GETTING there is such an awful experience that I would never do it if not for the fact I have family there. The American tourism industry must REALLY be hurting, because everyone I talk to here says "oh I'd love to go to the US, but all that security and fingerprinting... no thanks". They all go to Europe or Asia instead.
Of course, it's usually obvious from context which is meant and which system is being used, as you would be writing 16,2 for the first example and omitting the insignificant zeros...
Actually Minecraft chugs like crazy on anything older than about 4 years (with dedicated GPU), and if you are using integrated graphics, it chugs on pretty much everything. I tried it the other day on a ~brand new~ PC which happened to have integrated graphics and it was close to unplayable unless you put the draw distance down to the lowest setting (which is like 10 metres in front of you, lol).
Minecraft is written in pure Java and is known to perform like a dog. It doesn't need much in the way of CPU, but is very dependant on having good 3D acceleration, even though it 'looks' pixelly and blocky and not hardware accelerated at all...;)
Still I love it. Fantastic game. I just wish it performed better... I have 3 year old laptops that run things like WoW silky smooth that can barely handle Minecraft (which looks a lot 'worse' by comparison).
You're right, but I think connections will become more symmetric over time, even if they never reach 1:1.
People are starting to push 'the cloud' for home users in quite a big way. E.g. those Microsoft ads with them steaming video from their home network while they wait at an airport. Online backup services. Etc. These require a decent amount of upstream bandwidth to perform well.
Myself I'm on 20/1 ADSL2+. I find the 1 Mbps upstream quite limiting at times... uploading a large photoset to Flickr for instance takes hours. My ISP offers ADSL2+ Annex M for an extra fee that would bump my upstream to 2.5 Mbps, at the cost of some downstream bandwidth... I'm thinking about taking them up on that offer.
Either way I think residential internet access will remain asymmetric in the future, but perhaps less-so than today. For instance, the limit of standard of ADSL is 24 Mbps down/1 Mbps up (or 2.5 up for Annex M). So that's in the range of 20:1 or 10:1 ratio. However the fibre plans that they are rolling out in my country at the moment all feature a ratio in the vicinity of 4:1 or 5:1: e.g. 50/10, 100/25, etc.
And as a comparison I'm currently paying $39.95/mo for 20/1 ADSL2+ in Australia. That's bundled with home phone though... it'd be 49.95 without the POTS connection (i.e. aked DSL).
Australia, until quite recently, sucked, because although it offered faster average ~speeds~ than most North American places (those without FiOS or equivalent), it also tended to have hard download caps. But in the last year or so there's been an explosion of affordable plans with massive (i.e. 1TB+) caps and a few unlimited plans popping up. This is in no small part due to the opening of PPC1 (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pipe_Pacific_Cable) which has massively increased capacity to the US (and reduced cost, due to the other major cable, SXC, finally having some competition).
Having said that, wait around 5 years. All going to plan (and subsequent governments not canning the project), the National Broadband Network should be towards the end of its rollout by then, and we should beat the pants off US/Canada. Fibre capable of 100 Mbit - 1 Gbit, depending on switching equipment, to ~94% of Australian premises. Yes OMG socialism etc... it is costing the taxpayer a lot, but but this isn't vapourware, there are already paying customers getting 100 Mbit from this, for less than I pay for my ADSL connection now).
Upon arriving at the destination but before passing through customs, find a place with a WiFi or 3G connection to the internet and upload any changed data.
Good luck with that (well, WiFi at least). In most countries you are filed off the plane, down a long corridor, and immediately into the immigration/customs hall. It's unlikely you would find a WiFi connection in that space of time.
3G obviously would work if you had a valid and operating SIM card for the country you are landing in... but again, you'd look kinda suspicious whipping a laptop out in the corridor immediately after getting off the plane with everyone else pushing past you to get into the immigration lines...
Hmm yes good point. Might keep it and use it just as a display for Blurays and games consoles and such.
A lot of electronics support multi-voltage input these days. My Nintendo Wii has no issues moving between US/AU, for instance. TVs are bigger though so maybe not. I can always get a transformer though (which don't cost much compared to the cost of a new TV).
Because the number you are dialing is a mobile number. The US is unusual in that its cell numbers look like 'normal' numbers. Which is kinda weird if you think about it, since 'mobiles' are, well, mobile, and not tied to a particular area.
In most places, you can clearly distinguish a mobile number from other numbers. Either:
- Mobile numbers are shorter or longer than landlines; or
- Mobiles have their own area code. For instance in Australia, a number with the 04 'area code' is a mobile number and charged accordingly.
Indeed. The tweet may or may not have been the straw that broke the camel's back, in this case, but it's clear that her being imprisoned is not directly or solely because of the tweet. The summary mentions the stuff that she REALLY got imprisoned for (but mentions it in a "oh and also, this is probably irrelevant, but..." way):)
Yep same here in Australia - it displayed the tower name (which was the suburb). Kinda useful actually when you are diagnosing poor signal issues.
Kind of a shame though that most newish phones don't seem to have the cell broadcast option anymore (despite the fact that they all have GSM fallback and the data is still being broadcast). Growing up with various old Nokias, they always had the option (and usually it was on by default). Now phones don't even have the option.
We a system like this in Australia for emergency warnings: bushfires, cyclones etc. It works by sending an SMS to all phones currently connected to specific cell towers in the emergency area, irrespective of network, phone number or anything else.
This is actually a very accurate way of doing things: it guarantees noone outside that area (well, further than a few dozen km away) will receive an unnecessary warning.
Yes, there are ~$30 unlocked phones available in most countries. Remember that locking phones to networks is not a widespread practice in much of the world.
For instance, I'm in Australia and a very quick Google finds examples such as:
I don't understand this at all. If you buy a (very) low end Nokia you essentially GET a very simple phone: 2G/GSM only, with calling, text and maybe a couple of very simple little apps like a calculator and clock. Cause the screen is small and it doesn't use 3G, battery life is typically 2 weeks or so. And the low end Nokia is a LOT cheaper than this phone.
I mean yes, I know that this phone is in fact even SIMPLER than the simplest Nokia, but not by much. The most brain-dead luddite in the world can use those simple Nokias just fine. So I'm not sure if there is really a market for this phone.
SMS spam? I never knew such a thing existed...surely that would be a very expensive operation for the spammer? SMSes aren't cheap (well, when you start sending out millions of them, at least).
I've had a phone capable of SMS since 1996, lived in 3 different countries in that time, and I can honestly say I've never received an unsolicited SMS.
I think LTE will be the way to go - that's the way most of the world seems to be going.
And as you say, it could eventually make moving a phone between the major US networks a possibility. I think America needs to avoid the trap it has fallen into often in the past: not using standards the rest of the world uses (or not even agreeing on a standard across the whole of the US, for that matter). I remember even in the 90s, my phone would work almost everywhere in the world... except in the US. America (and Japan) seem to always be the exceptions in the tech world: TDMA/CDMA vs. GSM; NTSC vs. PAL, etc...
Here in Australia they are testing LTE for mobile phone networks, but there are also quite a few WiMAX networks up and running (and have been for a few years). But the WiMAX networks aren't for phones: they are for fixed wireless broadband services (i.e. antenna on your roof, for people that can't get DSL/cable/fibre).
Not really. Remember, it's only in America that the iPhone is tied to a single (and hence, over-congested) network. iThings are sold in dozens of countries and in most of them, are used on whatever network the purchaser wishes.
Having said that, the implication that iDevices are responsible for the bulk of traffic on phone networks isn't really true these days. It was true initially when the iPhone was one of the first popular consumer devices that encouraged mobile data use, but now there are many good alternatives. So the problems AT&T is having are also being suffered by every other network, whether it be caused by iPhones, Android-based phones, or whatever.
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Agreed. Provided the kid isn't vegetating on it all the time, it adds to the experience of their formative years. A child of that age should be packing in as many experiences as possible - yes this includes outdoor activities, physical activities, mental activities and developing motor skills by manipulating real-world objects, but there's no harm in spending an hour or two clicking around on a computer either.
Admittedly I never had a computer ~of my own~ until 1995, at which point I was 13 years old (I'm 28 now). And what a beast it was: 486 DX4/100, 8MB of RAM (which I upgraded to 16 the next year) and a quad-speed (OMG) CD-ROM. But I did use other people's computers from a very early age. In fact, I started using computers in preschool (Apple IIs, no less), so I would have been around 4 years old at that time. A bit later, aged 7-10 or so, we were given an original IBM AT (completely with clicky keyboard) by my uncle who was upgrading to a 386. I figured out how to use DOS during those years, and by extension, the fundamentals of files, directories and using a CLI to manipulate them. BTW that IBM AT is still down the garage at my parents' place, and still boots fine (DOS 5.x). The hard drive rumbles like thunder but it keeps going - amazing considering the garage is uninsulated and I live in inland Australia where it would be exposed to a range of around -5 C -> 45 C each year (23 F -> 113 F).
Now of course, as a kid, it was mostly games that interested me. I remember spending a lot of time screwing around with autoexec.bat/config.sys/himem.sys/emm386 etc. trying to get more precious conventional memory to run games. But that was educational in itself, and is what got me interested in computers in the first place. It eventually led to an enjoyable career in my adult life, so I don't think it was harmful at all.
The iPad is a 'coffee table' type device. Let's face it, 99% of the time you just want to look something up quickly on a website, or check your mail. Printing is one of those things you only do every now and again. So yes, you go to a 'real computer' to do that. But how often does that happen? I can't remember the last time I actually needed to print something for a non-work purpose (and for work, I'd be using a real computer to begin with).
Noone, even Apple zealots, suggests the iPad is a replacement for an actual computer - that's daft. It's a simple web/media/ebook reading device that you can leave on the coffee table and look stuff up quickly when the need arises. It boots basically instantly and has far longer battery life than any laptop (and some netbooks). If you are the kind of person that always has a real computer powered on and within reach of you, then yeah, iPad is a useless purchase for you. If you print stuff regularly, then iPad is not for you either. But not everyone uses technology the same way...
I don't know why there's this mentality that everyone is either rabidly pro- or anti- iDevice/Apple. Assess each device on its merits and compare with how you as an individual use technology. iDevices are the sweet spot for many people. Personally, I do have an iPhone, but on the other hand all my computers and laptops are PCs and I don't own an iPad. Right now there's no real niche in my life that it would fill since I tend to use my phone for quickly looking things up. Perhaps if I started reading ebooks or watching movies in bed or something I'd get an iPad. If I travelled more the 3G iPad might be good too - it's light and has good battery life, and when you're travelling let's face it, all you really need is web, email and GPS.
Thank you AC. People saying "could care less" when the phrase is actually "couldN'T care less" is my second greatest grammar-Nazi-inducing action. Right behind lose/loose at #1.
I'm in full agreement with your post - Apple products aren't "inferior" unless the only thing that matters to you is performance bang for buck, or sheer number of features. But for many people, these simply AREN'T the things that matter. They are looking for quality, reliabilty and ease of use. But not everyone who buys Apple does so for the same reason.
For me, even though I'm a geek and generally against locked down hardware/software ecosystems, it comes down to hardware quality. How it looks and feels. Simple as that.
Pick up a typical Dell/HP/Asus/Toshiba/etc laptop by a corner. Feel that cheap plastic casing flex under the weight. Hear it creak. Close and open it and feel that cheap plastic clip click into place in a way that lets you just ~know~ it's going to break after a year or two.
Now pick up a Macbook Pro in the same way. It's chalk and cheese. Apple get away with charging 2x what others do for the same specs (CPU, RAM etc) because of various reasons ... it's ignorance for some people, true ... but I'm as techy as they come and I see the attraction. Solidly built hardware makes a HUGE difference to how people feel about a product and how confident they are in it.
Now because I'm a geek and like to tinker, Apple's relatively locked down ecosystem of products doesn't appeal to me, just like it doesn't appeal to quite a lot of Slashdotters. But for appliance-type objects like a phone, music player, or coffee-table web/ebook reader (i.e. tablet), yes, I choose Apple. I don't care about their performance or the ability to run arbitrary code on these kind of devices. I just want them to work well and not get in the way, and to feel solid and well-built in the hand. When I want to tinker I'll fire up one of my PCs or non-Apple laptops.
Agreed. Having an external antenna wasn't as dumb a decision as people seem to think. By virtue of it, the base level of reception the iPhone 4 receives is BETTER than previous phones with internal antennas. It's only if you mash something conductive (slightly moist hand, for instance) into that gap in the bottom left corner that you see a drop in reception.
Having said that, I have an iPhone 4, don't use a case at all, and have never had a REAL WORLD issue with reception. Yeah ok so if I push my finger into the 'magic spot' I lose a bar or two. But it doesn't have any real world consequences for me, other than some bars on a screen going down. Calls don't drop, data still flows. So I go from 5 bars to 4 or 4 bars to 3, big deal.
But you're right - they should have included a bumper in the box. For someone who lives in an area with very marginal reception (e.g. 1 bar), the antenna can be a problem. The bit of added attenuation added by their hand can take them from 'bad reception' to 'no reception'. It's one of those things that totally depends on where you are, how good your carrier is (remember, outside of America the iPhone isn't tied to a particular carrier, and carriers are NOT created equal as far as network quality and reception go), and how you use your phone (e.g. if you mostly use it for data, it's unlikely the antenna is going to worry you too much since you aren't typically holding it in a way that will cause a problem).
Mostly cause we get 20 days leave a year (legal minimum permitted here) but most of my American side of the family get half of that, if they're lucky. So we can visit them longer than they can visit us. So yeah, there'll be plenty of next times. Yay!
Mod parent up...this is exactly right.
I'm not an American, but my wife is. I therefore enter the US to visit family on a regular basis ... over 20 visits in the last decade. The first time I visited was in 2001, prior to 9/11. The change I have seen in US airports in that time is stunning.
I put up with the slower, more detailed bag x-rays. I put up with the taking your shoes off crap (that you don't have to do in any other country). I put up with the dudes at the immigration desk becoming far more threatening and suspicious and just downright rude.
I ... reluctantly ... put up with the fact that they took first one, then two, and now ALL TEN of my fingerprints on every entry. To put this in perspective, in my country, fingerprints are not used as a form of ID as they seem to be in the US. The only people who have their fingerprints recorded are criminals. So the only people on earth who have a record of my fingerprints are a FOREIGN government (not even my own government has them). Does that seem ridiculous to anyone else? But I digress...
But this year when I entered I had to go through the damn nudie scanners. Now I realised I could opt out, and I did. But as a foreigner, they really gave me the once over. Now let me clarify here - I'm Australian - I speak English, I'm white, I have no criminal record, and I in no way would be considered a 'high risk' profile. But they made it very clear that they didn't want scary foreigners like me opting out of the scanning. And frankly, next trip, I will just go through the damn scanner. The alternative took ten times longer and was far more invasive and left me with a bad impression of the US as a whole. I thought the fingerprinting was the final straw for me but no, this is ridiculous.
So yes, the TSA is terrifying. They make the alternatives to the scanner very unattractive due to the lost time and increased questioning. So people 'preferring the scanner' is not because the like the idea. It's just the lesser of two evils.
It's a real shame - I love visiting the US. For all it's flaws it's a fascinating country. But GETTING there is such an awful experience that I would never do it if not for the fact I have family there. The American tourism industry must REALLY be hurting, because everyone I talk to here says "oh I'd love to go to the US, but all that security and fingerprinting ... no thanks". They all go to Europe or Asia instead.
Tis the opposite in many other areas:
16,200 = Sixteen and two-tenths
16.200 = Sixteen thousand, two-hundred.
Of course, it's usually obvious from context which is meant and which system is being used, as you would be writing 16,2 for the first example and omitting the insignificant zeros...
Actually Minecraft chugs like crazy on anything older than about 4 years (with dedicated GPU), and if you are using integrated graphics, it chugs on pretty much everything. I tried it the other day on a ~brand new~ PC which happened to have integrated graphics and it was close to unplayable unless you put the draw distance down to the lowest setting (which is like 10 metres in front of you, lol).
Minecraft is written in pure Java and is known to perform like a dog. It doesn't need much in the way of CPU, but is very dependant on having good 3D acceleration, even though it 'looks' pixelly and blocky and not hardware accelerated at all... ;)
Still I love it. Fantastic game. I just wish it performed better ... I have 3 year old laptops that run things like WoW silky smooth that can barely handle Minecraft (which looks a lot 'worse' by comparison).
You're right, but I think connections will become more symmetric over time, even if they never reach 1:1.
People are starting to push 'the cloud' for home users in quite a big way. E.g. those Microsoft ads with them steaming video from their home network while they wait at an airport. Online backup services. Etc. These require a decent amount of upstream bandwidth to perform well.
Myself I'm on 20/1 ADSL2+. I find the 1 Mbps upstream quite limiting at times ... uploading a large photoset to Flickr for instance takes hours. My ISP offers ADSL2+ Annex M for an extra fee that would bump my upstream to 2.5 Mbps, at the cost of some downstream bandwidth ... I'm thinking about taking them up on that offer.
Either way I think residential internet access will remain asymmetric in the future, but perhaps less-so than today. For instance, the limit of standard of ADSL is 24 Mbps down/1 Mbps up (or 2.5 up for Annex M). So that's in the range of 20:1 or 10:1 ratio. However the fibre plans that they are rolling out in my country at the moment all feature a ratio in the vicinity of 4:1 or 5:1: e.g. 50/10, 100/25, etc.
And as a comparison I'm currently paying $39.95/mo for 20/1 ADSL2+ in Australia. That's bundled with home phone though ... it'd be 49.95 without the POTS connection (i.e. aked DSL).
Australia, until quite recently, sucked, because although it offered faster average ~speeds~ than most North American places (those without FiOS or equivalent), it also tended to have hard download caps. But in the last year or so there's been an explosion of affordable plans with massive (i.e. 1TB+) caps and a few unlimited plans popping up. This is in no small part due to the opening of PPC1 (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pipe_Pacific_Cable) which has massively increased capacity to the US (and reduced cost, due to the other major cable, SXC, finally having some competition).
Having said that, wait around 5 years. All going to plan (and subsequent governments not canning the project), the National Broadband Network should be towards the end of its rollout by then, and we should beat the pants off US/Canada. Fibre capable of 100 Mbit - 1 Gbit, depending on switching equipment, to ~94% of Australian premises. Yes OMG socialism etc ... it is costing the taxpayer a lot, but but this isn't vapourware, there are already paying customers getting 100 Mbit from this, for less than I pay for my ADSL connection now).
They do. In the US you must clear customs even if you are only transiting.
(Yes it's weird and annoying, but that's the way it is).
Upon arriving at the destination but before passing through customs, find a place with a WiFi or 3G connection to the internet and upload any changed data.
Good luck with that (well, WiFi at least). In most countries you are filed off the plane, down a long corridor, and immediately into the immigration/customs hall. It's unlikely you would find a WiFi connection in that space of time.
3G obviously would work if you had a valid and operating SIM card for the country you are landing in ... but again, you'd look kinda suspicious whipping a laptop out in the corridor immediately after getting off the plane with everyone else pushing past you to get into the immigration lines...
Hmm yes good point. Might keep it and use it just as a display for Blurays and games consoles and such.
A lot of electronics support multi-voltage input these days. My Nintendo Wii has no issues moving between US/AU, for instance. TVs are bigger though so maybe not. I can always get a transformer though (which don't cost much compared to the cost of a new TV).
Because the number you are dialing is a mobile number. The US is unusual in that its cell numbers look like 'normal' numbers. Which is kinda weird if you think about it, since 'mobiles' are, well, mobile, and not tied to a particular area.
In most places, you can clearly distinguish a mobile number from other numbers. Either:
- Mobile numbers are shorter or longer than landlines; or
- Mobiles have their own area code. For instance in Australia, a number with the 04 'area code' is a mobile number and charged accordingly.
Indeed. The tweet may or may not have been the straw that broke the camel's back, in this case, but it's clear that her being imprisoned is not directly or solely because of the tweet. The summary mentions the stuff that she REALLY got imprisoned for (but mentions it in a "oh and also, this is probably irrelevant, but ..." way) :)
Yep same here in Australia - it displayed the tower name (which was the suburb). Kinda useful actually when you are diagnosing poor signal issues.
Kind of a shame though that most newish phones don't seem to have the cell broadcast option anymore (despite the fact that they all have GSM fallback and the data is still being broadcast). Growing up with various old Nokias, they always had the option (and usually it was on by default). Now phones don't even have the option.
Another reason why the North American system of the ~receiver~ paying for things is really, really dumb. AFAIK they don't do that anywhere else.
Parent is correct.
We a system like this in Australia for emergency warnings: bushfires, cyclones etc. It works by sending an SMS to all phones currently connected to specific cell towers in the emergency area, irrespective of network, phone number or anything else.
This is actually a very accurate way of doing things: it guarantees noone outside that area (well, further than a few dozen km away) will receive an unnecessary warning.
Yes, there are ~$30 unlocked phones available in most countries. Remember that locking phones to networks is not a widespread practice in much of the world.
For instance, I'm in Australia and a very quick Google finds examples such as:
http://www.techoni.com.au/product_info.php?products_id=29150 (Samsung, 32 AUD = $31.35 USD, unlocked)
http://www.outrightmobilephone.com.au/index.php/nokia-1616-black-unlocked-cheap-mobile-phone-australian-stock.html (Nokia, 33 AUD = $32.33 USD, unlocked)
Etc...
Admittedly these are still a bit more complex than the phone in TFA, but not by much. And they are a ~lot~ cheaper. :)
I don't understand this at all. If you buy a (very) low end Nokia you essentially GET a very simple phone: 2G/GSM only, with calling, text and maybe a couple of very simple little apps like a calculator and clock. Cause the screen is small and it doesn't use 3G, battery life is typically 2 weeks or so. And the low end Nokia is a LOT cheaper than this phone.
I mean yes, I know that this phone is in fact even SIMPLER than the simplest Nokia, but not by much. The most brain-dead luddite in the world can use those simple Nokias just fine. So I'm not sure if there is really a market for this phone.
SMS spam? I never knew such a thing existed...surely that would be a very expensive operation for the spammer? SMSes aren't cheap (well, when you start sending out millions of them, at least).
I've had a phone capable of SMS since 1996, lived in 3 different countries in that time, and I can honestly say I've never received an unsolicited SMS.
Oh, another TV-related one: ATSC vs. DVB-T :P
Which annoys me a lot as I have an awesome TV here in Australia (DVB-T) that I'll have to throw away when I move back to the US in a year or two :(
I think LTE will be the way to go - that's the way most of the world seems to be going.
And as you say, it could eventually make moving a phone between the major US networks a possibility. I think America needs to avoid the trap it has fallen into often in the past: not using standards the rest of the world uses (or not even agreeing on a standard across the whole of the US, for that matter). I remember even in the 90s, my phone would work almost everywhere in the world ... except in the US. America (and Japan) seem to always be the exceptions in the tech world: TDMA/CDMA vs. GSM; NTSC vs. PAL, etc...
Here in Australia they are testing LTE for mobile phone networks, but there are also quite a few WiMAX networks up and running (and have been for a few years). But the WiMAX networks aren't for phones: they are for fixed wireless broadband services (i.e. antenna on your roof, for people that can't get DSL/cable/fibre).
Not really. Remember, it's only in America that the iPhone is tied to a single (and hence, over-congested) network. iThings are sold in dozens of countries and in most of them, are used on whatever network the purchaser wishes.
Having said that, the implication that iDevices are responsible for the bulk of traffic on phone networks isn't really true these days. It was true initially when the iPhone was one of the first popular consumer devices that encouraged mobile data use, but now there are many good alternatives. So the problems AT&T is having are also being suffered by every other network, whether it be caused by iPhones, Android-based phones, or whatever.