-Of course Apple isn't the only company that does this to people, but it's still a reason why I don't consider them some kind of 'savior' for the mobile phone world. We don't know how Apple will handle the repair question yet, but from personal experience cellular carriers will not repair phones out of warranty, and sometimes not even in warranty. I have phones with Verizon and "former AT&T", and both have told me I must buy a new phone to make any changes to my contract. Both phones are working just fine.
If the 'consumers' feel they're being screwed by the cell phone operators, they don't need to purchase their services. True, if they can do without a cell phone. All cell phone operators screw their customers, so you either choose the least offensive screwer or you don't get a phone. Apple, while not pristine, is less of a screwer than most other high tech companies.
None of the $30 billion is coming from Microsoft. It's coming from Warren Buffet's stock in Berkshire Hathaway, the company he founded. The existing endowment of the Gates Foundation comes from Bill Gates' stock in MS, and is a result (if you will) of MS's monopoly and predatory practices.
There is a long tradition of this (supporting charities through monopolistic profits), such as the Carnegie Foundation, the Russell Sage Foundation, the Ford Foundation, etc. Bill and Melinda are following in the footsteps of their capitalist predecessors.
The question of whether a charity should accept money from donors with questionable business ethics has been long debated and never resolved. George Bernard Shaw wrote several plays about this question, and he didn't have an answer. His best was probably Major Barbara, in which the Salvation Army must decide whether or not to accept support from a gin distiller and an arms manufacturer.
As the administrator of an L-Soft listserv installation I may have some insight into your problem. We had a similar problem last year when we implemented a listserv feature that would put the recipient's email address in the body of a message. This also changes the "sent from" field in the header to an alternate address format that Verizon doesn't recognize. Verizon then rejects the message on the basis that it can't resolve the sender's address. of the 100+ different ISPs on our lists Verizon was the only one that had this problem. The problem went away when we disabled this feature.
NASA requires a security clearance and background check. Yet they couldn't catch even the basic fact that he lied about his degree?
I don't blame the NY Times for accepting a NASA release; where is the security in our government? It seems to be easier to get a job with NASA than a driver's license.
Wrong Big Bang is a Theory. A theory is a hypothesis with evidence pointing to that fact. While theorys may not be what is happening it seems to fit the data well, in the experements. A Law which are quite rare in science is when something is proven without a doubt.
Agreed that Big Bang is a Theory. However, in science a Law is slightly different. A Law is something observable; e.g., you can demonstrate Newton's Laws, Hook's Law, Bernoulli's Law, etc., and describe them mathematically, without actually understanding why they are true. A Theory is the explanation of the Law.
Darwin's Theory of Evolution by means of Natural Selection explains the observable fact that species evolve. This fact was known long before Charles Darwin, but the mechanism for the observed facts was not understood. Darwin and Wallace provided an explanation that fit the observations and was verifiable, and thus was admitted to science as a Theory.
People need to learn these basic concepts to understand science. Science is more of a processes of finding fact vs. soldid fact itself.
The more evidence you have for your theory the better your theory is and more widly excepted as truth as we know it.
Science is not about answers. Science is a way of asking questions. (Not original with me).
(b) your battery requires replacement after being out of warranty
This has become a mantra in any discussion about hybrids, but it is a non-issue. When you buy a new car are you concerned about transmission replacement, engine replacement, or differential replacement, all of which have comparable or higher costs to battery replacement? In a Prius (or other hybrid) the engine is expected to last longer because it is never stressed; it runs in a narrow RMP range, and it shuts down when stopped. For supporting evidence, there have been no engine failures since the first Prius hit the road. Other components last longer also; actual experience shows that brakes last over 100,000 miles, because most braking is regenerative, recapturing energy in the battery.
Data so far indicate that hybrid batteries outlast most transmissions. As the Prius does not have a transmission*, this is a fair balance of costs. The battery in a Prius is warranteed for 100,000 miles (150,000 in Califormia). That's a full replacement, not prorated. Since the first Prius appeared in Japan in 1998 there have been no battery failures other than from physical damage. There are owners with over 200,000 miles on the original battery.
Even the cost of battery replacement is exaggerated. The current replacement cost is about $3,000 for a new battery, or $750 for one from a wreck. This is half the cost 3 years ago, and will likely continue to drop as the industry ramps up to manufacture batteries to meet the ever increasing demand.
The bottom line is that the total maintenance cost must be considered, not just the cost of maintenance of one component of the power train. The experience of hybrid owners to date is that total maintenance costs of a hybrid are substantially lower than conventional cars.
-------------- *The Prius electric motors and gas engine directly drive the wheels through a continuously engaged planetary gearset. Toyota calls it a PSD (Power Split Device). Thre is no shifting and thus nothing to break. There isn't even a reverse gear; to go backwards, the electric motor runs in reverse.
Good guess, but actual experience says otherwise. My 2001 Prius will never fail to start in cold weather, because it is started by a 275v battery and 40 HP electric motor. The traction battery is NiMH, which does not degrade as badly in the cold as does a 12 lead acid battery. The NiMH battery (and the 12V gel cell accessory battery) are locate in the trunk, which is heated by cabin air via a small circulating fan. Thus, the batteries are not cold for very long.
The 2004 and later models perform even better in the cold. The primary reason is that they have a thermos storage bottle for engine coolant that keeps it hot when the engine is off, so it warms up much more quickly after being restarted (within 8-24 hrs, depending on temperature).
The car's fuel economy is slightly lower in the cold, but this is true for all cars. It has nothing to do with being a hybrid; it's simply that internal combustion engines are less efficient in cold weather.
A couple of years ago one of the mags drop tested a bunch, and found that Brenthaven and Tumi provided significantly better protection than any of the others.
I got mail this morning on my Verizon account that was sent last Wednesday (5 days). Verizon makes this sound like it is something new, though; in reality their mail started having problems on November 20, and it hasn't recovered since.
In addition, Verizon's NNTP server has been our of service more than in for the past 3 weeks.
I'm not sure I believe that spam is the problem; it's just an excuse for their inability to operate an ISP competently.
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None of the $30 billion is coming from Microsoft. It's coming from Warren Buffet's stock in Berkshire Hathaway, the company he founded. The existing endowment of the Gates Foundation comes from Bill Gates' stock in MS, and is a result (if you will) of MS's monopoly and predatory practices.
There is a long tradition of this (supporting charities through monopolistic profits), such as the Carnegie Foundation, the Russell Sage Foundation, the Ford Foundation, etc. Bill and Melinda are following in the footsteps of their capitalist predecessors.
The question of whether a charity should accept money from donors with questionable business ethics has been long debated and never resolved. George Bernard Shaw wrote several plays about this question, and he didn't have an answer. His best was probably Major Barbara, in which the Salvation Army must decide whether or not to accept support from a gin distiller and an arms manufacturer.
As the administrator of an L-Soft listserv installation I may have some insight into your problem. We had a similar problem last year when we implemented a listserv feature that would put the recipient's email address in the body of a message. This also changes the "sent from" field in the header to an alternate address format that Verizon doesn't recognize. Verizon then rejects the message on the basis that it can't resolve the sender's address. of the 100+ different ISPs on our lists Verizon was the only one that had this problem. The problem went away when we disabled this feature.
NASA requires a security clearance and background check. Yet they couldn't catch even the basic fact that he lied about his degree?
I don't blame the NY Times for accepting a NASA release; where is the security in our government? It seems to be easier to get a job with NASA than a driver's license.
Big Bang is an hypothesis
Wrong Big Bang is a Theory. A theory is a hypothesis with evidence pointing to that fact. While theorys may not be what is happening it seems to fit the data well, in the experements. A Law which are quite rare in science is when something is proven without a doubt.
Agreed that Big Bang is a Theory. However, in science a Law is slightly different. A Law is something observable; e.g., you can demonstrate Newton's Laws, Hook's Law, Bernoulli's Law, etc., and describe them mathematically, without actually understanding why they are true. A Theory is the explanation of the Law.
Darwin's Theory of Evolution by means of Natural Selection explains the observable fact that species evolve. This fact was known long before Charles Darwin, but the mechanism for the observed facts was not understood. Darwin and Wallace provided an explanation that fit the observations and was verifiable, and thus was admitted to science as a Theory.
People need to learn these basic concepts to understand science. Science is more of a processes of finding fact vs. soldid fact itself. The more evidence you have for your theory the better your theory is and more widly excepted as truth as we know it.
Science is not about answers. Science is a way of asking questions. (Not original with me).
(b) your battery requires replacement after being out of warranty
This has become a mantra in any discussion about hybrids, but it is a non-issue. When you buy a new car are you concerned about transmission replacement, engine replacement, or differential replacement, all of which have comparable or higher costs to battery replacement? In a Prius (or other hybrid) the engine is expected to last longer because it is never stressed; it runs in a narrow RMP range, and it shuts down when stopped. For supporting evidence, there have been no engine failures since the first Prius hit the road. Other components last longer also; actual experience shows that brakes last over 100,000 miles, because most braking is regenerative, recapturing energy in the battery.
Data so far indicate that hybrid batteries outlast most transmissions. As the Prius does not have a transmission*, this is a fair balance of costs. The battery in a Prius is warranteed for 100,000 miles (150,000 in Califormia). That's a full replacement, not prorated. Since the first Prius appeared in Japan in 1998 there have been no battery failures other than from physical damage. There are owners with over 200,000 miles on the original battery.
Even the cost of battery replacement is exaggerated. The current replacement cost is about $3,000 for a new battery, or $750 for one from a wreck. This is half the cost 3 years ago, and will likely continue to drop as the industry ramps up to manufacture batteries to meet the ever increasing demand.
The bottom line is that the total maintenance cost must be considered, not just the cost of maintenance of one component of the power train. The experience of hybrid owners to date is that total maintenance costs of a hybrid are substantially lower than conventional cars.
--------------
*The Prius electric motors and gas engine directly drive the wheels through a continuously engaged planetary gearset. Toyota calls it a PSD (Power Split Device). Thre is no shifting and thus nothing to break. There isn't even a reverse gear; to go backwards, the electric motor runs in reverse.
Good guess, but actual experience says otherwise. My 2001 Prius will never fail to start in cold weather, because it is started by a 275v battery and 40 HP electric motor. The traction battery is NiMH, which does not degrade as badly in the cold as does a 12 lead acid battery. The NiMH battery (and the 12V gel cell accessory battery) are locate in the trunk, which is heated by cabin air via a small circulating fan. Thus, the batteries are not cold for very long.
The 2004 and later models perform even better in the cold. The primary reason is that they have a thermos storage bottle for engine coolant that keeps it hot when the engine is off, so it warms up much more quickly after being restarted (within 8-24 hrs, depending on temperature).
The car's fuel economy is slightly lower in the cold, but this is true for all cars. It has nothing to do with being a hybrid; it's simply that internal combustion engines are less efficient in cold weather.
A couple of years ago one of the mags drop tested a bunch, and found that Brenthaven and Tumi provided significantly better protection than any of the others.
I can confirm that this is not true. I cannot relay through Verizon from my office, even though my headers all say Verizon.
I got mail this morning on my Verizon account that was sent last Wednesday (5 days). Verizon makes this sound like it is something new, though; in reality their mail started having problems on November 20, and it hasn't recovered since. In addition, Verizon's NNTP server has been our of service more than in for the past 3 weeks. I'm not sure I believe that spam is the problem; it's just an excuse for their inability to operate an ISP competently.