If you are afraid of what people think of you if they know you don't have a car, then take control of the conversation. I know that some people are aghast when they find out I have no car. So I tell them that my car was sitting in a parking garage for weeks at a time. I tell them that I did the math and it was costing nearly $700 a month for ALL the expenses related to owning it so I sold it. I now walk, take taxis, rent a car when I want one, and yes, take the bus and train if it is more direct than a taxi. And I have yet to spend more than $400 in a month on transportation. Most months are less than $100.
By the time I finish telling them about all the extra stuff my wife and I do with the money saved, they are mostly jealous, not sympathetic. It sucks to be them, dependent on a money-wasting hunk of metal.
If they are doing their job, the antennas should be optimized for the horizontal, meaning that the signal from above is going to be very weak.
Most likely, a small cellular base station will be installed on board, creating a "nanocell" inside the plane. Given the difference on power levels, mobiles will attach to it and not to the cell towers on the ground.
Both of these points are correct. Antennas are almost always very directional. The only exceptions are most likely CDMA antennas in the more rural areas where the carrier does not have the load to justify more than one or two towers over a large area or land. Here in Chicago, a T-Mobile phone will not have service above the ~40th floor of the Sears Tower. People that work there (and in a number of other tall buildings in the city) will always get Cingular because they are the only provider that seems to recognize the fact that tall buildings exist in downtown areas.
Second, the most successful scenario for cell phones on planes is probably a picocell or nanocell transmitter on the plane itself. Phones would definitely attach to that cell, but would still attempt to monitor "neighboring" cells. You can "force" a cell phone to stop monitoring the neighboring cells, but that is not foolproof and in many cases needs the user to configure the phone itself via menus. Additionally, you have to consider that some people use CDMA and others GSM (and UMTS, etc). Are you going to limit the type of phone that can be used? Not everyone knows what type of phone they have!
There are definitely some technical hurdles that must be cleared before cell phones would work well on a plane, and then you have to deal with the insane amounts of annoyance caused by clueless users.
There will continue to be a market for Sat radio as there continues to be a market for local broadcast radio. Your Tb of home-stored mp3's and movies won't tell you why people are meeting in town to discuss tonight's city council meeting, who died today, the status of rain, or what those fire engines were at 2 in the morning. They won't show you things you don't already know. Sure, you can get those things from the 'net in other ways, but many people like it this way, and the media is flexible to find new folks who like it in a slightly different way that it can accomodate.
I definitely agree with you about the demand and the existence of markets, but I think the method of delivery is going to change. Just as the cell phone networks are salivating over the fact that it looks like Wimax is going to make the backhaul portion of a cell network much much cheaper while at the same time increasing bandwidth, Wimax looks like it will have the capability to make metropolitan wifi networks much much cheaper while again providing a lot of bandwidth. The provisioning and handoff features of Wimax will eliminate the problems large wifi networks have of terrible performance when lots of devices are connected, and the QoS will allow easy throttling of bandwidth hogs. The way I see it, we are probably within 10 years of a seamless nationwide IPv6 wifi network becoming cost-effective. VoIP and streaming audio that is uninterrupted as you drive cross-country will be possible and it will be a real competitor to satellite radio and cell phone networks at the same time.
Did Slashdot notice that starting with the Ford Focus this summer, all Ford cars will have the Microsoft Sync hardware as an option on their vehicle? There was a video on YouTube of an engineer demonstrating some functionality that nobody realized was possible. They just tried it and it worked: An engineer tuned into an internet radio station from the UK on his Blackberry. He then made a bluetooth connection between the Blackberry and the Ford and the music was piped through the car speakers.
Come summer 2007, anyone with an unlimited data plan on a cellphone device that also is willing to buy a Ford has a satellite radio competitor available to them.
The quality will only get better of course, and once we have national wifi networks in place this is probably going to take of and legitimately challenge Sirius/XM.
Yes, lovely lovely contract law, which, when push comes to shove, really just says that a contract means what the two parties thought it means when they agreed to the contract.
If an American company and a British guy were to enter into a contract in which the American company were to provide boots to the British guy and the American company knew full well that the British guy thinks boots are those storage spaces at the back of automobiles, the American company would get in trouble if they shipped the guy a box of calf-high footwear.
Oh, but the contract says boots! Tough luck! Not quite. Amazingly, common sense would prevail.
If Amazon is offering a buy one, get one free sale and the customer knows that Amazon is offering a buy one, get one free sale then if the customer acts upon that sale, it doesn't matter so much what the contract (bill of sale) says, it MEANS that the customer is going to buy one and then get one free. There was simply an honest mistake in the contract. What becomes of such a thing?
1) If the customer knows the contract is a mistake and goes ahead with the intention of profiting, it borders on fraud. 2) If the customer doesn't realize that it is a mistake ("ooh I must be the lucky 100th buyer, I get both for free!"), then the contract is simply invalid. As you know, a contract is only valid once both sides receive appropriate consideration! Paying nothing or nearly nothing for $50+ worth of DVDs is not appropriate consideration.
Amazon is acting like a good corporation, assuming you are an honest person and asking you to either return the unopened DVDs to make it like the contract never happened or to pay the price they intended to charge you to make the contract a valid contract.
Consumer protection laws are not likely to come into play. First, they protect consumers acting in good faith. If you were to challenge credit card charges or cancel a card to avoid paying, who is going to believe you are acting in good faith? Certainly not a judge. Second, if you were to act like a proper citizen and take the high road while still maintaining that you should be entitled to the whole thing for free, Amazon is not going to pursue it very long. They have better things to do; they'll just refund your money and offer an apology.
You forgot an even more powerful group - the homeless. Yes, your eyes are not playing tricks on you.
If you are a nice enough person to go help out a non-profit, you might find it odd that the homeless person you are trying to help asks you to email him about something. EMAIL? To a HOMELESS person??? Yes, or at least here in Chicago (a fine city in Illinois, no less).
The Chicago Public Library (with the help of some non-profits) has gone out of its way to ensure that homeless people in Chicago have internet access and are able to use it to help their situation. It is very likely that some of them are using Linked In as they try to get jobs. It is also very likely that some of them are users of the services of some of the various non-profits in the Chicago area.
Here's the thing - really big law firms, in their selfish ways, want to be the most prestigious law firm in the city. One of their ways to accomplish this goal is to offer up lots of pro-bono work (it makes them look good). In a big city like Chicago, there are lots of big law firms competing against each other and thus millions of dollars worth of free legal services are provided every year. You don't realize it's so prevalent because most of the free legal work goes to non-profits, who have become masters at latching on to a law firm and directing the free legal services their way (they do it by aggressively recruiting young lawyers to be members of their group - and then when you are a big shot at your firm you will likely become a board member of the non-profit. It just so happens that you become aware of legal problems at about the same time you have the authority at your firm to direct some pro-bono work. Quite clever in fact).
What will happen: 1) Homeless person X can't get to Linked In anymore 2) Homeless person X complains to a non-profit worker who happens to be a lawyer at BIG SHOTS LLP 3) 1 week later the headline of the Chicago Tribune reads "Suburban republicans prevent homeless from getting jobs, BIG SHOTS LLP files suit" 4) Law is repealed/ruled unconstitutional 5) ??? 6) Profit (for BIG SHOTS LLP, who got a leg up in the recruiting season and landed twice as many Yale grads as SHYSTER & SHYSTER LLP and was able to up their billing rate by $30/hour)
Just as an FYI, the US District Court for the Eastern District of Texas has become very popular of late for the "little guy" suing a big corporation. The juries down there seem to hate large companies;)
A lawsuit in the Eastern District of Texas is almost always associated with patent trolling, since the Eastern District of Texas certainly doesn't have much in the way of large cities, large corporations, or large R&D departments. Why it exists is a pretty decent question.
Hopefully this is a good place to ask a solar-related question...
I am looking at buying a nice condo here in Chicago. This condo has a great sunny terrace on the roof and would be a good place for a solar panel, maybe two. We have net metering here, but two panels are never going to make the meter spin backwards (at least I don't think it would). Is it possible to connect the panels to the grid only as a supplement that reduces the amount of electricity drawn from the grid? If I have to go to the full expense of a net metering system, I don't think it would be worth the cost.
I worked for a major retailer for 17 years, then Feb 18 2005 wammo! My job was replaced by offshoring. The person now at my desk is a figurehead (or project manager) for a programming group in Bangalore.
Thanks, Jim
Jim, it really sucks to have your job shipped overseas. It happened to me as well. Now, I have a question for you - are you currently better off? Do you have a new job?
I used to work for a major Fortune 500 company that shed about 50,000 jobs in the 5 years I worked for them, some were let go simply to make the company leaner, some left for greener pastures before they got the tap on the shoulder, but most were replaced with offshore developers. Every singe person I knew ended up better off and most of them are still doing software development. Of course I don't know all 50,000, but I've never heard any rumors or other talk about people that didn't get new jobs somewhere else.
I am not resentful at all. While it sucked to train my replacement, I feel that I did a good job and I feel great that I helped another person improve their life. I am currently better off, and so is he. I am healthier, in better shape, and happier than when I was working at what became a hellhole. I don't have that terrible commute anymore. I don't even have a car anymore! I walk where I need to go (obviously not everyone lives in an urban area - but they should consider the advantages). My net worth has gone up, my savings have gone up. It's very possible that getting laid off was one of the best things that ever happened to me.
PS - I still check Dice, craigslist, Monster, etc and the number of open development positions seems higher than it was last year when I got laid off. It sure seems that the local economy had the ability to absorb all those job losses and in fact expand.
While I doubt what they saw is locally-made, I used to live in that area and have seen some crazy stuff at some nearby forest preserves. Many of the forest preserves near O'Hare have radio controlled aircraft landing strips and are heavily used by local hobbyists. Last year I personally saw a home-built craft performing some absolutely incredible tricks and maneuvers with a small radio controlled helicopter-like machine.
That's a strange number to order. Is that for a full year? If so, why order them all at once?
Just for a reference, Motorola sells around 10 million RAZRs a quarter. I don't think Apple is crazy enough to believe the iPhone is going to be that popular.
Its come to a stage where the biggies are using patents just to create an entry barrier for smaller companies and individuals. There can be no other reason why Microsoft would still want patents in place, considering that they have gotten hit over and over again, and again by patents which atleast violate the principle of common sense. Surely, MS (and most other companies which refuse to come out against patents) would have some game plan there.
To tell the truth, the biggies absolutely hate suing the little guy for patent infringement. All the little guy has to do is ask for a jury trial and the odds of the large corporation winning go way down. In fact, as far as anyone is concerned, the outcome of a large corporation vs. a little guy in a jury trial is about as certain as a coin flip unless it's an extremely egregious patent infringement case.
The big guys duke it out with the big guys all the time, but when it comes to dealing with the little guys, the big guys really just hope for a quick settlement.
The real problem is the patent trolls and the submarine patents, which are little guys going against both small and large corporations. The Patent Office is trying to address this (and have probably eliminated the ability for any new submarine patents), but are really at the behest of Congress, since it's Congress that sets their high-level rules. And it's Congress that raids their bank account year after year, effectively preventing the Patent Office from hiring as many patent examiners as they need (and otherwise could afford).
Irrelevant. FCC regulations require service providers to connect any 911 emergency calls. That's why you can [supposedly] connect a phone to a jack with no service and dial 911, or use a cell phone that has no account and dial 911. It is Vonage's responsibility to see that this happens each time every time. There is no burden on the consumer for this one. If Vonage doesn't like it, they can choose not to be in the telcom business in the US.
I work in the cell phone infrastructure business. It's not really FCC regulations that make it so, it's a requirement of the various cell phone technologies.
A cell phone recognizes 911 (and the other emergency numbers used around the world) as an emergency call, picks the closest tower and requests an emergency call. It's a different process than making a normal call and bypasses nearly all of the steps involved with making a call (including such things as authentication, determining if you are allowed access, if you are roaming or local, if you should be billed, and a host of other steps). If there is no capacity, the base station will disconnect a paying call to make room. Whether you have a SIM card in the phone or even an active account is irrelevant to the whole process.
When we test new systems and major software upgrades, we attempt emergency calls first. Not really because we want to make sure they work, it's because it's a lot easier to set one up!
But can I buy it from Walmart for $30 and use on T-mobile network? The article lacks details - is it GSM phone and which frequencies are covered? Is it locked for to specific operator. Otherwise exchanging SIM card should not be problem and if it is even locked, I guess there are services that can provide unlocking for a small fee. My current phone batery is failing and I don't want to enter in another yearly contact with T-mobile or other company. I just want to buy a cheap but good quality phone, without extras, even color screen is unnecessary. Just calling and receiving calls and occasional SMS.
I suggest you try buying the phone and putting your T-Mobile SIM card in it. Most if not all of the phones sold to the pre-paid companies are unlocked. They have no business case to lock the phone, so why bother?
I've noticed that the news media report about the Justice Department as if it were some impartial and authoritative entitiy when it comes to non-criminal stuff.
When the AP reports that the Justice Dept. rejects Google's privacy concerns, it holds a lot of weight with the general public, as if it were some important and final ruling. Well, the Justice Dept. has to reject Google's privacy concerns, because they are essentially the "law firm" representing the other side.
It is important for people to understand that the Justice Dept is simply a cabinet-level organization beholden to the President of the United States. When it comes to non-criminal issues, they do nothing more than advocate for the side that the President is taking. Anything they issue is simply their opinion.
I'm not trying to imply that Slashdot members are dumb or don't know this, but the general public seems to not know this distinction and I am hoping to clear up any confusion some Slashdot members may have.
Maybe I'm completely off base, but I think I remember hearing that if you don't defend your trade mark, you can lose your rights to it. Patents should be the same way, if you knowingly allow your patent to be infringed apon for 3 years and never so much as mention it to the infringer, why should you have the right to sue?
I'm not a lawyer, but my wife is an intellectual property lawyer and tried explaining this to me. I'll try to explain it, but I may get some details wrong.
In fact patent infringers do have a similar protection. If you knowingly allow someone to infringe on your patent but wait for a while before filing an infringement lawsuit against them you give up the ability to collect damages during the period you knew about the infringement but did nothing about it. And I think it limits the amount of damages you can collect for the infringement after the lawsuit is filed.
In effect, you get a free ride on their intellectual property for as long as they knowingly allow you to infringe without doing anything to stop it. But as long as the patent is valid, they will always have the ability to stop you from infringing at any time.
If anyone can clarify further that would be appreciated.
Offtopic - What amazes me as a Swede is that all Anglo-saxon countries I've been to build so incredibly flimsy and energy-inefficient houses. England, Australia, and from what I've heard, the US as well. I mean, you are rich countries, why build like third world?
First, the average middle- to lower-class house in rich Anglo-saxon countries is built far better than its counterpart in the third world.
Second, in rich countries houses are very expensive and people can hardly afford to live close to a city center, let alone build their house solidly. Labor is expensive, materials are expensive, and land is expensive. Come to the USA where sprawl rules and you will see that people spend 3+ hours a day driving to and from work. Why? Because the lot their house was built on cost US$50,000-100,000 less than if they lived much closer. And if they can't afford the difference in the price of the land it's not difficult to extrapolate that and believe they can't afford the difference in the price of the materials.
So we end up with cheaply built houses that really only need to last 50 years, because by then the lot will be so valuable that it's cost-effective to tear down the house and build a new one in its place.
People keep referring to their 10 year old CDs that still work just fine, but with the exremely competitive blank disc market, manufacturers are constantly looking to cut costs. As a result, the quality has been steadily declining. But that's ok. I would expect that 80% or more of all CDs burned today will have been thrown away 3 or 4 years from now. Most CDs are not burned for long-term backup.
If you really want long-term backup solutions, buy the true archival quality discs. You wont find them on the shelf at Best Buy for obvious reasons, but they are easily available if you go looking for them.
The trick would be to design these crumple zones with cheaper, yet effective materials. Then in response to the high cost of damages, make the parts/materials cheaper for the consumer to replace/repair. In contrast to the suggestion of changes to testing practices, it seems like cheaper to replace crumple zones would be a better change for both manufacturing and consumers.
Given how competitive the auto industry is, any manufacturer that could figure out how to build any part of the car out of cheaper materials yet give up nothing in safety or performance is going to have a significant advantage over the other manufacturers. I'm sure they've all been working on making this a reality for years.
Get real. They may settle a class action suit, at most. The lawyers will get like thirty million apiece, and the users will get a coupon for $3 off their next purchase of a Sony music CD.
Actually, that isn't happening anymore. You must remember that class-action bill that Bush signed into law back in February? The "pro-business" one that forces many of these lawsuits into federal court? Yeah, apparently the 2nd part of the law got lost in all that hoopla. It made these coupon settlements a lot more fair.
First, if you are going to settle for something other than cash, the lawyers involved are now only allowed to get paid based on the value of the coupons actually redeemed or they can choose to get paid based on their normal hourly rate times the number of hours they can prove they actually worked on the case. At $500 an hour, they are going to have to prove they worked 60,000 hours if they think they're going to get $30 million.
Second, the judge is now required to give public notice and have a hearing where anyone can come complain about how unfair the proposed settlement is.
Third, after that public hearing, the judge has to publish a written statement justifying his findings of fairness.
Lastly, the judge is allowed to order any unredeemed coupons be given to charitable or governmental entities. And these "donated" coupons don't count towards the calculations for lawyers fees, whether they are ultimately redeemed or not.
All in all, the lawyers are now going to have to work a lot harder to get the huge settlement fees that they've grown accustomed to. And the likelyhood of the class members getting a fair settlement are much higher (assuming they deserve such a thing in the first place).
But they relate to the actual corporate culture and where, in a Q.A. world that still targets a quality level attempting to minimize "product giveaway" (that's making a product that is better than needed), past history is often a pretty fair predictor of future quality. Now that I've been an amateur photographer for over 30 years (I worked two jobs in high school to buy my first Minolta SRT-201), I hope I get some creds when I remember avoiding Pentax because they were cheaply made (and I actually rolled my car *over* that Minolta with no ill effects, but this is all anecdotal too:) ). Pentax, if they *wanted* to could make highly reliable digital cameras, but folks who are looking for highly reliable digital cameras are not their market - at this juncture, Nikon and Canon have much to lose
I have absolutely no experience with the point and shoot Pentax cameras, only their SLRs. My wife has a film SLR of theirs that has just recently begun eating batteries. Rumor has it that the fix is very easy (a metal contact has likely been bent to always have the light meter turned on). Given the cost of that camera new (about $100 in 2000), we didn't expect a very rugged camera and all in all it exceded our expectations. As long as you remember to take the batteries out when you are done shooting for the day the camera is perfect. Given that it has been abused on trips through about 10 countries, ranging from the Australian Outback to the tropical rainforests of Costa Rica, I would hold it up as a model of product reliability. A $100 SLR is not expected to survive this type of abuse.
I also have a Pentax *istDS digital SLR that has been rock solid in the 10 months I've had it. Granted it's only been on a trip to Mexico thus far so I can't say that it has survived years of abuse. The construction absolutely blows any low-end Canon or Nikon DSLR out of the water. You really have to go to the 2-3 times as expensive models before you see something as solid as this. Not only that, but unlike the Canon and Nikon models in the same price range, it has a durable metal lens mount instead of plastic. Word is the Canon Digital Rebels have a very good chance of shutter failure within 5000 photos taken. I've yet to hear about a shutter failure with a Pentax DSLR.
For all I know, Pentax point and shoots are absolute junk. But their SLRs are great and I would never hesitate to recommend one to anybody. The only problem is lens availability. You probably have to rely more on the internet than your local store. But they are worth it!
Cars should come with audio-in jacks (optical, 3.5mm) and USB2 connections.
Both standards. Non of this silly BMW business of putting custom iPod connectors into their cars.
USB is especially nice as it can also be used to power USB-powered devices such as PDAs and sat navs.
Actually, the new BMW 3-series has an audio-in jack as standard equipment. For extra money, you can have the hard-wired iPod-specific connector that allows you to use the radio controls to control the iPod.
I don't think that's what happened. I was at a demonstration on how air bags work. At GM oddly enough. There are multiple accelerometers in a car. Air bags are triggered only if there is a sudden change in momentum detected by more than one sensor. Simultaneously. That would be very difficult to accomplish on a parked car.
Additionally, let's not forget the obvious - the accelerometers aren't exactly located in a place where you can smack them with a baseball bat from outside of the vehicle.
Somebody watched Fight Club and believed everything they saw.
Slashdot Mirror
If you are afraid of what people think of you if they know you don't have a car, then take control of the conversation. I know that some people are aghast when they find out I have no car. So I tell them that my car was sitting in a parking garage for weeks at a time. I tell them that I did the math and it was costing nearly $700 a month for ALL the expenses related to owning it so I sold it. I now walk, take taxis, rent a car when I want one, and yes, take the bus and train if it is more direct than a taxi. And I have yet to spend more than $400 in a month on transportation. Most months are less than $100.
By the time I finish telling them about all the extra stuff my wife and I do with the money saved, they are mostly jealous, not sympathetic. It sucks to be them, dependent on a money-wasting hunk of metal.
If they are doing their job, the antennas should be optimized for the horizontal, meaning that the signal from above is going to be very weak.
Most likely, a small cellular base station will be installed on board, creating a "nanocell" inside the plane. Given the difference on power levels, mobiles will attach to it and not to the cell towers on the ground.
Both of these points are correct. Antennas are almost always very directional. The only exceptions are most likely CDMA antennas in the more rural areas where the carrier does not have the load to justify more than one or two towers over a large area or land. Here in Chicago, a T-Mobile phone will not have service above the ~40th floor of the Sears Tower. People that work there (and in a number of other tall buildings in the city) will always get Cingular because they are the only provider that seems to recognize the fact that tall buildings exist in downtown areas.
Second, the most successful scenario for cell phones on planes is probably a picocell or nanocell transmitter on the plane itself. Phones would definitely attach to that cell, but would still attempt to monitor "neighboring" cells. You can "force" a cell phone to stop monitoring the neighboring cells, but that is not foolproof and in many cases needs the user to configure the phone itself via menus. Additionally, you have to consider that some people use CDMA and others GSM (and UMTS, etc). Are you going to limit the type of phone that can be used? Not everyone knows what type of phone they have!
There are definitely some technical hurdles that must be cleared before cell phones would work well on a plane, and then you have to deal with the insane amounts of annoyance caused by clueless users.
There will continue to be a market for Sat radio as there continues to be a market for local broadcast radio. Your Tb of home-stored mp3's and movies won't tell you why people are meeting in town to discuss tonight's city council meeting, who died today, the status of rain, or what those fire engines were at 2 in the morning. They won't show you things you don't already know. Sure, you can get those things from the 'net in other ways, but many people like it this way, and the media is flexible to find new folks who like it in a slightly different way that it can accomodate.
I definitely agree with you about the demand and the existence of markets, but I think the method of delivery is going to change. Just as the cell phone networks are salivating over the fact that it looks like Wimax is going to make the backhaul portion of a cell network much much cheaper while at the same time increasing bandwidth, Wimax looks like it will have the capability to make metropolitan wifi networks much much cheaper while again providing a lot of bandwidth. The provisioning and handoff features of Wimax will eliminate the problems large wifi networks have of terrible performance when lots of devices are connected, and the QoS will allow easy throttling of bandwidth hogs. The way I see it, we are probably within 10 years of a seamless nationwide IPv6 wifi network becoming cost-effective. VoIP and streaming audio that is uninterrupted as you drive cross-country will be possible and it will be a real competitor to satellite radio and cell phone networks at the same time.
Did Slashdot notice that starting with the Ford Focus this summer, all Ford cars will have the Microsoft Sync hardware as an option on their vehicle? There was a video on YouTube of an engineer demonstrating some functionality that nobody realized was possible. They just tried it and it worked:
An engineer tuned into an internet radio station from the UK on his Blackberry.
He then made a bluetooth connection between the Blackberry and the Ford and the music was piped through the car speakers.
Come summer 2007, anyone with an unlimited data plan on a cellphone device that also is willing to buy a Ford has a satellite radio competitor available to them.
The quality will only get better of course, and once we have national wifi networks in place this is probably going to take of and legitimately challenge Sirius/XM.
Or at least that's my hypothesis.
Microwaving yourself may possibly cause you to stand out in a crowd more than being wrapped in tin foil.
It comes down to contract law I suspect
Yes, lovely lovely contract law, which, when push comes to shove, really just says that a contract means what the two parties thought it means when they agreed to the contract.
If an American company and a British guy were to enter into a contract in which the American company were to provide boots to the British guy and the American company knew full well that the British guy thinks boots are those storage spaces at the back of automobiles, the American company would get in trouble if they shipped the guy a box of calf-high footwear.
Oh, but the contract says boots! Tough luck! Not quite. Amazingly, common sense would prevail.
If Amazon is offering a buy one, get one free sale and the customer knows that Amazon is offering a buy one, get one free sale then if the customer acts upon that sale, it doesn't matter so much what the contract (bill of sale) says, it MEANS that the customer is going to buy one and then get one free. There was simply an honest mistake in the contract. What becomes of such a thing?
1) If the customer knows the contract is a mistake and goes ahead with the intention of profiting, it borders on fraud.
2) If the customer doesn't realize that it is a mistake ("ooh I must be the lucky 100th buyer, I get both for free!"), then the contract is simply invalid. As you know, a contract is only valid once both sides receive appropriate consideration! Paying nothing or nearly nothing for $50+ worth of DVDs is not appropriate consideration.
Amazon is acting like a good corporation, assuming you are an honest person and asking you to either return the unopened DVDs to make it like the contract never happened or to pay the price they intended to charge you to make the contract a valid contract.
Consumer protection laws are not likely to come into play. First, they protect consumers acting in good faith. If you were to challenge credit card charges or cancel a card to avoid paying, who is going to believe you are acting in good faith? Certainly not a judge. Second, if you were to act like a proper citizen and take the high road while still maintaining that you should be entitled to the whole thing for free, Amazon is not going to pursue it very long. They have better things to do; they'll just refund your money and offer an apology.
You forgot an even more powerful group - the homeless. Yes, your eyes are not playing tricks on you.
If you are a nice enough person to go help out a non-profit, you might find it odd that the homeless person you are trying to help asks you to email him about something. EMAIL? To a HOMELESS person??? Yes, or at least here in Chicago (a fine city in Illinois, no less).
The Chicago Public Library (with the help of some non-profits) has gone out of its way to ensure that homeless people in Chicago have internet access and are able to use it to help their situation. It is very likely that some of them are using Linked In as they try to get jobs. It is also very likely that some of them are users of the services of some of the various non-profits in the Chicago area.
Here's the thing - really big law firms, in their selfish ways, want to be the most prestigious law firm in the city. One of their ways to accomplish this goal is to offer up lots of pro-bono work (it makes them look good). In a big city like Chicago, there are lots of big law firms competing against each other and thus millions of dollars worth of free legal services are provided every year. You don't realize it's so prevalent because most of the free legal work goes to non-profits, who have become masters at latching on to a law firm and directing the free legal services their way (they do it by aggressively recruiting young lawyers to be members of their group - and then when you are a big shot at your firm you will likely become a board member of the non-profit. It just so happens that you become aware of legal problems at about the same time you have the authority at your firm to direct some pro-bono work. Quite clever in fact).
What will happen:
1) Homeless person X can't get to Linked In anymore
2) Homeless person X complains to a non-profit worker who happens to be a lawyer at BIG SHOTS LLP
3) 1 week later the headline of the Chicago Tribune reads "Suburban republicans prevent homeless from getting jobs, BIG SHOTS LLP files suit"
4) Law is repealed/ruled unconstitutional
5) ???
6) Profit (for BIG SHOTS LLP, who got a leg up in the recruiting season and landed twice as many Yale grads as SHYSTER & SHYSTER LLP and was able to up their billing rate by $30/hour)
Just as an FYI, the US District Court for the Eastern District of Texas has become very popular of late for the "little guy" suing a big corporation. The juries down there seem to hate large companies ;)
A lawsuit in the Eastern District of Texas is almost always associated with patent trolling, since the Eastern District of Texas certainly doesn't have much in the way of large cities, large corporations, or large R&D departments. Why it exists is a pretty decent question.
Hopefully this is a good place to ask a solar-related question...
I am looking at buying a nice condo here in Chicago. This condo has a great sunny terrace on the roof and would be a good place for a solar panel, maybe two. We have net metering here, but two panels are never going to make the meter spin backwards (at least I don't think it would). Is it possible to connect the panels to the grid only as a supplement that reduces the amount of electricity drawn from the grid? If I have to go to the full expense of a net metering system, I don't think it would be worth the cost.
I worked for a major retailer for 17 years, then Feb 18 2005 wammo! My job was replaced by offshoring. The person now at my desk is a figurehead (or project manager) for a programming group in Bangalore.
Thanks,
Jim
Jim, it really sucks to have your job shipped overseas. It happened to me as well. Now, I have a question for you - are you currently better off? Do you have a new job?
I used to work for a major Fortune 500 company that shed about 50,000 jobs in the 5 years I worked for them, some were let go simply to make the company leaner, some left for greener pastures before they got the tap on the shoulder, but most were replaced with offshore developers. Every singe person I knew ended up better off and most of them are still doing software development. Of course I don't know all 50,000, but I've never heard any rumors or other talk about people that didn't get new jobs somewhere else.
I am not resentful at all. While it sucked to train my replacement, I feel that I did a good job and I feel great that I helped another person improve their life. I am currently better off, and so is he.
I am healthier, in better shape, and happier than when I was working at what became a hellhole. I don't have that terrible commute anymore. I don't even have a car anymore! I walk where I need to go (obviously not everyone lives in an urban area - but they should consider the advantages). My net worth has gone up, my savings have gone up. It's very possible that getting laid off was one of the best things that ever happened to me.
PS - I still check Dice, craigslist, Monster, etc and the number of open development positions seems higher than it was last year when I got laid off. It sure seems that the local economy had the ability to absorb all those job losses and in fact expand.
While I doubt what they saw is locally-made, I used to live in that area and have seen some crazy stuff at some nearby forest preserves. Many of the forest preserves near O'Hare have radio controlled aircraft landing strips and are heavily used by local hobbyists. Last year I personally saw a home-built craft performing some absolutely incredible tricks and maneuvers with a small radio controlled helicopter-like machine.
Welcome to O'Hare Intergalactic Airport.
That's a strange number to order. Is that for a full year? If so, why order them all at once?
Just for a reference, Motorola sells around 10 million RAZRs a quarter. I don't think Apple is crazy enough to believe the iPhone is going to be that popular.
The Chinese have been trying for years to lose that pesky Most-Favored-Nation status, and this administration is not going to give in.
Its come to a stage where the biggies are using patents just to create an entry barrier for smaller companies and individuals. There can be no other reason why Microsoft would still want patents in place, considering that they have gotten hit over and over again, and again by patents which atleast violate the principle of common sense. Surely, MS (and most other companies which refuse to come out against patents) would have some game plan there.
To tell the truth, the biggies absolutely hate suing the little guy for patent infringement. All the little guy has to do is ask for a jury trial and the odds of the large corporation winning go way down. In fact, as far as anyone is concerned, the outcome of a large corporation vs. a little guy in a jury trial is about as certain as a coin flip unless it's an extremely egregious patent infringement case.
The big guys duke it out with the big guys all the time, but when it comes to dealing with the little guys, the big guys really just hope for a quick settlement.
The real problem is the patent trolls and the submarine patents, which are little guys going against both small and large corporations. The Patent Office is trying to address this (and have probably eliminated the ability for any new submarine patents), but are really at the behest of Congress, since it's Congress that sets their high-level rules. And it's Congress that raids their bank account year after year, effectively preventing the Patent Office from hiring as many patent examiners as they need (and otherwise could afford).
Irrelevant. FCC regulations require service providers to connect any 911 emergency calls. That's why you can [supposedly] connect a phone to a jack with no service and dial 911, or use a cell phone that has no account and dial 911. It is Vonage's responsibility to see that this happens each time every time. There is no burden on the consumer for this one. If Vonage doesn't like it, they can choose not to be in the telcom business in the US.
I work in the cell phone infrastructure business. It's not really FCC regulations that make it so, it's a requirement of the various cell phone technologies.
A cell phone recognizes 911 (and the other emergency numbers used around the world) as an emergency call, picks the closest tower and requests an emergency call. It's a different process than making a normal call and bypasses nearly all of the steps involved with making a call (including such things as authentication, determining if you are allowed access, if you are roaming or local, if you should be billed, and a host of other steps). If there is no capacity, the base station will disconnect a paying call to make room. Whether you have a SIM card in the phone or even an active account is irrelevant to the whole process.
When we test new systems and major software upgrades, we attempt emergency calls first. Not really because we want to make sure they work, it's because it's a lot easier to set one up!
But can I buy it from Walmart for $30 and use on T-mobile network? The article lacks details - is it GSM phone and which frequencies are covered? Is it locked for to specific operator. Otherwise exchanging SIM card should not be problem and if it is even locked, I guess there are services that can provide unlocking for a small fee. My current phone batery is failing and I don't want to enter in another yearly contact with T-mobile or other company. I just want to buy a cheap but good quality phone, without extras, even color screen is unnecessary. Just calling and receiving calls and occasional SMS.
I suggest you try buying the phone and putting your T-Mobile SIM card in it. Most if not all of the phones sold to the pre-paid companies are unlocked. They have no business case to lock the phone, so why bother?
I've noticed that the news media report about the Justice Department as if it were some impartial and authoritative entitiy when it comes to non-criminal stuff.
When the AP reports that the Justice Dept. rejects Google's privacy concerns, it holds a lot of weight with the general public, as if it were some important and final ruling. Well, the Justice Dept. has to reject Google's privacy concerns, because they are essentially the "law firm" representing the other side.
It is important for people to understand that the Justice Dept is simply a cabinet-level organization beholden to the President of the United States. When it comes to non-criminal issues, they do nothing more than advocate for the side that the President is taking. Anything they issue is simply their opinion.
I'm not trying to imply that Slashdot members are dumb or don't know this, but the general public seems to not know this distinction and I am hoping to clear up any confusion some Slashdot members may have.
Maybe I'm completely off base, but I think I remember hearing that if you don't defend your trade mark, you can lose your rights to it. Patents should be the same way, if you knowingly allow your patent to be infringed apon for 3 years and never so much as mention it to the infringer, why should you have the right to sue?
I'm not a lawyer, but my wife is an intellectual property lawyer and tried explaining this to me. I'll try to explain it, but I may get some details wrong.
In fact patent infringers do have a similar protection. If you knowingly allow someone to infringe on your patent but wait for a while before filing an infringement lawsuit against them you give up the ability to collect damages during the period you knew about the infringement but did nothing about it. And I think it limits the amount of damages you can collect for the infringement after the lawsuit is filed.
In effect, you get a free ride on their intellectual property for as long as they knowingly allow you to infringe without doing anything to stop it. But as long as the patent is valid, they will always have the ability to stop you from infringing at any time.
If anyone can clarify further that would be appreciated.
Offtopic - What amazes me as a Swede is that all Anglo-saxon countries I've been to build so incredibly flimsy and energy-inefficient houses. England, Australia, and from what I've heard, the US as well. I mean, you are rich countries, why build like third world?
First, the average middle- to lower-class house in rich Anglo-saxon countries is built far better than its counterpart in the third world.
Second, in rich countries houses are very expensive and people can hardly afford to live close to a city center, let alone build their house solidly. Labor is expensive, materials are expensive, and land is expensive. Come to the USA where sprawl rules and you will see that people spend 3+ hours a day driving to and from work. Why? Because the lot their house was built on cost US$50,000-100,000 less than if they lived much closer. And if they can't afford the difference in the price of the land it's not difficult to extrapolate that and believe they can't afford the difference in the price of the materials.
So we end up with cheaply built houses that really only need to last 50 years, because by then the lot will be so valuable that it's cost-effective to tear down the house and build a new one in its place.
People keep referring to their 10 year old CDs that still work just fine, but with the exremely competitive blank disc market, manufacturers are constantly looking to cut costs. As a result, the quality has been steadily declining. But that's ok. I would expect that 80% or more of all CDs burned today will have been thrown away 3 or 4 years from now. Most CDs are not burned for long-term backup.
If you really want long-term backup solutions, buy the true archival quality discs. You wont find them on the shelf at Best Buy for obvious reasons, but they are easily available if you go looking for them.
The trick would be to design these crumple zones with cheaper, yet effective materials. Then in response to the high cost of damages, make the parts/materials cheaper for the consumer to replace/repair. In contrast to the suggestion of changes to testing practices, it seems like cheaper to replace crumple zones would be a better change for both manufacturing and consumers.
Given how competitive the auto industry is, any manufacturer that could figure out how to build any part of the car out of cheaper materials yet give up nothing in safety or performance is going to have a significant advantage over the other manufacturers. I'm sure they've all been working on making this a reality for years.
Get real. They may settle a class action suit, at most. The lawyers will get like thirty million apiece, and the users will get a coupon for $3 off their next purchase of a Sony music CD.
Actually, that isn't happening anymore. You must remember that class-action bill that Bush signed into law back in February? The "pro-business" one that forces many of these lawsuits into federal court? Yeah, apparently the 2nd part of the law got lost in all that hoopla. It made these coupon settlements a lot more fair.
First, if you are going to settle for something other than cash, the lawyers involved are now only allowed to get paid based on the value of the coupons actually redeemed or they can choose to get paid based on their normal hourly rate times the number of hours they can prove they actually worked on the case. At $500 an hour, they are going to have to prove they worked 60,000 hours if they think they're going to get $30 million.
Second, the judge is now required to give public notice and have a hearing where anyone can come complain about how unfair the proposed settlement is.
Third, after that public hearing, the judge has to publish a written statement justifying his findings of fairness.
Lastly, the judge is allowed to order any unredeemed coupons be given to charitable or governmental entities. And these "donated" coupons don't count towards the calculations for lawyers fees, whether they are ultimately redeemed or not.
All in all, the lawyers are now going to have to work a lot harder to get the huge settlement fees that they've grown accustomed to. And the likelyhood of the class members getting a fair settlement are much higher (assuming they deserve such a thing in the first place).
But they relate to the actual corporate culture and where, in a Q.A. world that still targets a quality level attempting to minimize "product giveaway" (that's making a product that is better than needed), past history is often a pretty fair predictor of future quality. Now that I've been an amateur photographer for over 30 years (I worked two jobs in high school to buy my first Minolta SRT-201), I hope I get some creds when I remember avoiding Pentax because they were cheaply made (and I actually rolled my car *over* that Minolta with no ill effects, but this is all anecdotal too :) ). Pentax, if they *wanted* to could make highly reliable digital cameras, but folks who are looking for highly reliable digital cameras are not their market - at this juncture, Nikon and Canon have much to lose
I have absolutely no experience with the point and shoot Pentax cameras, only their SLRs. My wife has a film SLR of theirs that has just recently begun eating batteries. Rumor has it that the fix is very easy (a metal contact has likely been bent to always have the light meter turned on). Given the cost of that camera new (about $100 in 2000), we didn't expect a very rugged camera and all in all it exceded our expectations. As long as you remember to take the batteries out when you are done shooting for the day the camera is perfect. Given that it has been abused on trips through about 10 countries, ranging from the Australian Outback to the tropical rainforests of Costa Rica, I would hold it up as a model of product reliability. A $100 SLR is not expected to survive this type of abuse.
I also have a Pentax *istDS digital SLR that has been rock solid in the 10 months I've had it. Granted it's only been on a trip to Mexico thus far so I can't say that it has survived years of abuse. The construction absolutely blows any low-end Canon or Nikon DSLR out of the water. You really have to go to the 2-3 times as expensive models before you see something as solid as this. Not only that, but unlike the Canon and Nikon models in the same price range, it has a durable metal lens mount instead of plastic. Word is the Canon Digital Rebels have a very good chance of shutter failure within 5000 photos taken. I've yet to hear about a shutter failure with a Pentax DSLR.
For all I know, Pentax point and shoots are absolute junk. But their SLRs are great and I would never hesitate to recommend one to anybody. The only problem is lens availability. You probably have to rely more on the internet than your local store. But they are worth it!
Cars should come with audio-in jacks (optical, 3.5mm) and USB2 connections.
Both standards. Non of this silly BMW business of putting custom iPod connectors into their cars.
USB is especially nice as it can also be used to power USB-powered devices such as PDAs and sat navs.
Actually, the new BMW 3-series has an audio-in jack as standard equipment. For extra money, you can have the hard-wired iPod-specific connector that allows you to use the radio controls to control the iPod.
I don't think that's what happened. I was at a demonstration on how air bags work. At GM oddly enough. There are multiple accelerometers in a car. Air bags are triggered only if there is a sudden change in momentum detected by more than one sensor. Simultaneously. That would be very difficult to accomplish on a parked car.
Additionally, let's not forget the obvious - the accelerometers aren't exactly located in a place where you can smack them with a baseball bat from outside of the vehicle.
Somebody watched Fight Club and believed everything they saw.