Motorola should offer this phone to Cingular/Verizon/Sprint/T-Mobile as part of a reduced-cost "pay as you go" service. The reason is simple: people don't really need most of the fancy features to start with. They need a phone that is reliable, offers good reception quality, and the ability to support wired headsets or Bluetooth wireless headsets.
I think the reason why Apple is going to a full touch-screen interface is due to the impending arrival of the true video iPod with its 16:9 aspect ratio widescreen display. And it's likely this new iPod will be the only device to use this new interface.
Meanwhile, the regular iPod interface will probably still be around for the audio-only iPods for the foreseeable future.
NOTE WELL: FLEXIBLE BLADES ARE FOR GIRLS ONLY. DO NOT USE THEM. THEY ARE CRAP.
I myself use the Schick Xtreme 3 triple-blade razor with the flexible blades and it's probably the closest shaves I've ever had, no contest. The Schick Quattro and Gillette Fusion are most cases overkill and not worth the money, in my humble opinion.
Here's how I get a clean shave:
1. Fill up a sink with hot water.
2. Let water cool a little bit, then splash face.
3. Rinse out shaver in water.
4. Apply a good-quality shaving gel (I use Edge brand shaving gel).
5. Shave normally, frequently rinsing out blades in water to remove excess shaving cream and hair to prevent blade clogging.
6. When you finish shaving, drain out hot water.
7. Turn on faucet with cold water and use the cold water to rinse your face clean and rinse the shaver.
8. Carefully wipe the shaver blades with a clean towel, making sure the towel lint doesn't clog the shaver.
If you use a good-quality shaving gel most of the time you don't need to apply an after-shave lotion.
While you can get a very close shave with a straight-edge razor, it's also quite dangerous to use because of the potential for serious cuts.
I myself use the Schick Xtreme 3 triple-blade razor with its flexible blades to conforms to your face contours and a decent shaving gel; if you frequently rinse your blades during shaving most people can get a very close shave indeed.
We're less likely to see a full Windows XP Service Pack given the fact that XP Service Pack 2 already forces you to either automatically update patches or at least inform the user of new patches.
The pencils provided at voting booths are both more than dark enough, and lack erasers. If you're saying that ballots might be erased after the fact, this is prevented by procedure; counting is done under supervision, there is no chance to erase a ballot.
That may be true in Canada, but given the notorious history of vote fraud in the USA, I'm not going take the chance. Hence my suggestion that mark sense ballots in the USA are filled out in either pen or ink stamp.
You have great points, but the ballot should be marked by a PERMANENT marker either with a pen or a ink stamp. The reason is simple: with an ink-based marking you run almost no risk of ballot miscounts or fraud due to erased or not fulled-marked selections using a pencil to fill in the ballot.
There is nothing wrong with paper ballots marked with a plain old pencil.
Absolutely, positively NO!!
Paper ballots should be filled out with a permanent marking system (either by pen or ink-based marker). With pencil-filled ballots, you have the issue of the marking not dark enough and erased markings, which can open the door for serious miscount and fraud issues.
Hate to break out the bad news, but I don't think ANY country fulfills your criteria.
You're not going to like living in the United Kingdom. Over there, the censorship laws are actually stricter (thank to the Official Secrets Act), and given the fact many British cities are installing cameras everywhere, privacy could be a problem, too.
You might like Denmark, but you need to be pretty fluent in both Danish and German to live there long term, in my humble opinion. And of course, you'll have to deal with Value Added Tax and breathtaking taxes of motor fuels common in Europe.
The problems with electronic voting systems--namely no paper trail--is the reason why many municipalities are switching to mark sense voting ballots.
Since mark sense paper ballots (filled out in pen to make sure the mark is clearly seen on the ballot) can be both machine-read and hand counted, this mostly avoids the Florida 2000 fiasco of difficulties reaching punched card ballots, complaints that electronic voting machines can be biased towards one candidate, and the numerous problems of the old mechanical voting machines.
Go out there a try to buy a PC-based computer with the Intel Core 2 Duo CPU, ATI Radeon X1xxx series graphics card, 1680x1050 (circa resolution) widescreen monitor, 1 GB of RAM, a decent sound card, dual-layer DVD burner, USB 2.0/FireWire ports, and Windows XP Professional. It'll probably cost almost as much as the Apple iMac 20" model with 1 GB of RAM.
Introducing new themes is one thing, but making sure your current themes and extensions installed in Firefox 1.5.0.7 migrate to Firefox 2.0 is quite something else. Remember the fiasco of extensions and themes breaking on the change from Firefox 1.0.7 to 1.5?
Apple began its revival with the unveiling of the iMac, which was a true all-in-one machine that was very easy to setup in terms of hardware use. But its revival didn't kick into high gear until the second-generation LCD-based iMac arrived with its swiveling display panel made it very attractive to users where desktop space was at a premium.
Today, the current iMac is a very attractive machine, costing only a little more than most PC's but offering things like widescreen display, Intel Core 2 Duo CPU's, and multimedia support galore. Small wonder why Apple has sold quite a lot of them lately....
While the early CRT-based iMacs did help Apple, in my opinion it wasn't until the arrival of the second-generation LCD-based iMac that that sales really took off. The dramatically smaller footprint of the second-generation model made it very desirable in homes and dorm rooms where desk space was at a premium.
Actually, today's Macintosh hardware isn't so ridiculously expensive anymore unless you're talking the high-end Mac Pro workstations.
The current iMac models are actually quite a value, especially the 20" model. It may cost a little bit more than a PC-based system, but you get so much standard that there are very few accessories to buy to get you going (maybe except more RAM installed). Small wonder why Apple sells quite a lot of iMacs to home users.
But what really saved Apple was the huge success of the iPod and the iTunes Music Store.
I still prefer MP3 CDs in the car. 8-10 hours per disk, room in my visor to hold 10 disks plus I can care more in the car door pocket if needed. No worries about someone swiping my CDs or my stereo and it's one less thing I have to carry to/from the car. And most modern car stereos are starting to support MP3 CD without needing an after-market stereo.
I have to disagree on that! With a 4 GB nano, you can load quite a lot of music onto the player assuming you use 160 kbps data rip rate from your CD's for AAC or MP3 encoding in the iTunes software. And given the size of the nano, you can stuff the player into your shirt pocket when you leave your car. Also, you can get inexpensive short-distance FM transmitters that transmit the audio from the iPod to your car stereo thru the FM tuner, so you don't really need a specialized car stereo with the iPod data connector port.
The fact is the iTunes Store was the first widely successful legit way to download songs.
In fact, it actually has helped a number of musicians because while the revenue from iTMS sales is not that great, the publicity will drive more real CD sales.
Show me a player that can be controlled by the car audio controls, other than the iPod (coming straight from the factory, no third-party hacks). My guess is you can't. I agree that any player can pipe their output to a line-in on the car audio deck, but the only player with car audio control support is the iPod.
Given the fact that iPods represent nearly around 4 out of 5 portable music players sold, is it small wonder where there is a substantial cottage industry selling iPod accessories and why new car stereos now include connectors to connect to the iPod data connector so the car stereo can directly control the player and also charge the iPod's battery?
So I guess you're opposed to satellite radio too, then? Not to mention he also listed radio shows (podcasts) that are high quality and absolutely free to download. The podcasts are basically ad free, with a mention of sponsors at the beginning and end of shows, while the subscriptions are definitely ad free.
There are a lot of podcasts you can download for free all over the Internet. TwIT.tv's excellent podcasts barely scratch the surface of the many high-quality podcasts available out there; another very good one is TV Guide magazine's weekly podcast, one of the best podcasts about the TV and movie industry out there. For US$6.95 per month (about the cost of two Starbucks lattes!) you can get the ESPN Insider subscription, where you can download ESPN Radio's four weekday radio shows.
Apple fans are fine with paying more for apple products. They have put up with paying the Apple premium for years. It's just recently that that premium has actually been reduced to the point where they're quite competitive for the money you pay (just look at the MacBook).
While iPods do cost more, they've also pretty much "set the bar" for what a portable music player should be. Once you master using one most other portable music players seem less functional in comparison.
I think what soured 20th Century Fox and Universal from doing the Halo movie was the fact that Superman Returns did pretty poorly considering how much was spent on that movie! The ridiculous production costs of blockbuster movies makes studios nervous, and you will see a lot more far less expensive movies over the next few years.
If you want to listen to an iPod without unhealthy high volume, get yourself a decent set of in-ear headphones. The Sony MDR-EX51LP costs around US$40 and definitely worth it, since being a true in-ear design you can 1) listen to the iPod clearly at lower volume settings and 2) actually extend the battery charge time on the iPod since lower volume levels lessens battery drain.
Sure, if you want great sound quality you can use the Shure E2C or E3C in-ear headphones, but these Shure headphones are pretty expensive.
I think the iPod has impacted our world in the following ways:
1) It has pretty much consigned the old "boomboxes" to near-complete obsolescene (thank G** for that!). People now listen to their own music with generally not disturbing others in a package far more convenient than even the old cassette player Walkmans.
2) It has changed the way we buy music, by legitimizing music downloads.
3) It has actually made radio talk shows more popular, as many on-air talk shows are now available for subscription-based download (ESPN Radio's Radio Insider and Premiere Radio Networks' Streamlink programs for example). We are seeing rapid growth of specialized downloadable talk shows (This Week in Technology (TWiT) being one of the best examples of this).
4) It has made it far more practical to not have to carry around your Compact Discs when listening to music in the car. Thanks to increased storage capacity on today's players you can "rip" your CD collection at higher sample rates and still put quite a lot of music on a single player for car playback. Also, many cars now offer standard auxiliary 1/8" jack input for all portable music players and some even offer special connectors to connect your newer-generation iPod so you can control the iPod from the car stereo controls and/or recharge the iPod's battery at the same time.
But here's the question: when do you think the Mozilla Foundation releases the final version of Firefox 2.0? My guess is probably within the next seven days, especially now that they're up to Release Candidate 3.
Slashdot Mirror
The fact that ZoneAlarm can do bi-directional firewall control is the reason why I don't use Windows' own incoming-block only firewall.
Motorola should offer this phone to Cingular/Verizon/Sprint/T-Mobile as part of a reduced-cost "pay as you go" service. The reason is simple: people don't really need most of the fancy features to start with. They need a phone that is reliable, offers good reception quality, and the ability to support wired headsets or Bluetooth wireless headsets.
I think the reason why Apple is going to a full touch-screen interface is due to the impending arrival of the true video iPod with its 16:9 aspect ratio widescreen display. And it's likely this new iPod will be the only device to use this new interface.
Meanwhile, the regular iPod interface will probably still be around for the audio-only iPods for the foreseeable future.
I absolutely agree. The potential for some cybercriminal to wipe out a whole bunch of WiFi-enabled iPods is a bit too tempting....
NOTE WELL: FLEXIBLE BLADES ARE FOR GIRLS ONLY. DO NOT USE THEM. THEY ARE CRAP.
I myself use the Schick Xtreme 3 triple-blade razor with the flexible blades and it's probably the closest shaves I've ever had, no contest. The Schick Quattro and Gillette Fusion are most cases overkill and not worth the money, in my humble opinion.
Here's how I get a clean shave:
1. Fill up a sink with hot water.
2. Let water cool a little bit, then splash face.
3. Rinse out shaver in water.
4. Apply a good-quality shaving gel (I use Edge brand shaving gel).
5. Shave normally, frequently rinsing out blades in water to remove excess shaving cream and hair to prevent blade clogging.
6. When you finish shaving, drain out hot water.
7. Turn on faucet with cold water and use the cold water to rinse your face clean and rinse the shaver.
8. Carefully wipe the shaver blades with a clean towel, making sure the towel lint doesn't clog the shaver.
If you use a good-quality shaving gel most of the time you don't need to apply an after-shave lotion.
No thanks.
While you can get a very close shave with a straight-edge razor, it's also quite dangerous to use because of the potential for serious cuts.
I myself use the Schick Xtreme 3 triple-blade razor with its flexible blades to conforms to your face contours and a decent shaving gel; if you frequently rinse your blades during shaving most people can get a very close shave indeed.
We're less likely to see a full Windows XP Service Pack given the fact that XP Service Pack 2 already forces you to either automatically update patches or at least inform the user of new patches.
The pencils provided at voting booths are both more than dark enough, and lack erasers. If you're saying that ballots might be erased after the fact, this is prevented by procedure; counting is done under supervision, there is no chance to erase a ballot.
That may be true in Canada, but given the notorious history of vote fraud in the USA, I'm not going take the chance. Hence my suggestion that mark sense ballots in the USA are filled out in either pen or ink stamp.
...Let's see how long before Apple updates the iTunes software and forces a firmware upgrade for all iPods to "close" this issue.
You have great points, but the ballot should be marked by a PERMANENT marker either with a pen or a ink stamp. The reason is simple: with an ink-based marking you run almost no risk of ballot miscounts or fraud due to erased or not fulled-marked selections using a pencil to fill in the ballot.
There is nothing wrong with paper ballots marked with a plain old pencil.
Absolutely, positively NO!!
Paper ballots should be filled out with a permanent marking system (either by pen or ink-based marker). With pencil-filled ballots, you have the issue of the marking not dark enough and erased markings, which can open the door for serious miscount and fraud issues.
Hate to break out the bad news, but I don't think ANY country fulfills your criteria.
You're not going to like living in the United Kingdom. Over there, the censorship laws are actually stricter (thank to the Official Secrets Act), and given the fact many British cities are installing cameras everywhere, privacy could be a problem, too.
You might like Denmark, but you need to be pretty fluent in both Danish and German to live there long term, in my humble opinion. And of course, you'll have to deal with Value Added Tax and breathtaking taxes of motor fuels common in Europe.
The problems with electronic voting systems--namely no paper trail--is the reason why many municipalities are switching to mark sense voting ballots.
Since mark sense paper ballots (filled out in pen to make sure the mark is clearly seen on the ballot) can be both machine-read and hand counted, this mostly avoids the Florida 2000 fiasco of difficulties reaching punched card ballots, complaints that electronic voting machines can be biased towards one candidate, and the numerous problems of the old mechanical voting machines.
Go out there a try to buy a PC-based computer with the Intel Core 2 Duo CPU, ATI Radeon X1xxx series graphics card, 1680x1050 (circa resolution) widescreen monitor, 1 GB of RAM, a decent sound card, dual-layer DVD burner, USB 2.0/FireWire ports, and Windows XP Professional. It'll probably cost almost as much as the Apple iMac 20" model with 1 GB of RAM.
But is this the official final release build of Firefox 2.0?
Introducing new themes is one thing, but making sure your current themes and extensions installed in Firefox 1.5.0.7 migrate to Firefox 2.0 is quite something else. Remember the fiasco of extensions and themes breaking on the change from Firefox 1.0.7 to 1.5?
Apple began its revival with the unveiling of the iMac, which was a true all-in-one machine that was very easy to setup in terms of hardware use. But its revival didn't kick into high gear until the second-generation LCD-based iMac arrived with its swiveling display panel made it very attractive to users where desktop space was at a premium.
Today, the current iMac is a very attractive machine, costing only a little more than most PC's but offering things like widescreen display, Intel Core 2 Duo CPU's, and multimedia support galore. Small wonder why Apple has sold quite a lot of them lately....
While the early CRT-based iMacs did help Apple, in my opinion it wasn't until the arrival of the second-generation LCD-based iMac that that sales really took off. The dramatically smaller footprint of the second-generation model made it very desirable in homes and dorm rooms where desk space was at a premium.
Actually, today's Macintosh hardware isn't so ridiculously expensive anymore unless you're talking the high-end Mac Pro workstations.
The current iMac models are actually quite a value, especially the 20" model. It may cost a little bit more than a PC-based system, but you get so much standard that there are very few accessories to buy to get you going (maybe except more RAM installed). Small wonder why Apple sells quite a lot of iMacs to home users.
But what really saved Apple was the huge success of the iPod and the iTunes Music Store.
I still prefer MP3 CDs in the car. 8-10 hours per disk, room in my visor to hold 10 disks plus I can care more in the car door pocket if needed. No worries about someone swiping my CDs or my stereo and it's one less thing I have to carry to/from the car. And most modern car stereos are starting to support MP3 CD without needing an after-market stereo.
I have to disagree on that! With a 4 GB nano, you can load quite a lot of music onto the player assuming you use 160 kbps data rip rate from your CD's for AAC or MP3 encoding in the iTunes software. And given the size of the nano, you can stuff the player into your shirt pocket when you leave your car. Also, you can get inexpensive short-distance FM transmitters that transmit the audio from the iPod to your car stereo thru the FM tuner, so you don't really need a specialized car stereo with the iPod data connector port.
The fact is the iTunes Store was the first widely successful legit way to download songs.
In fact, it actually has helped a number of musicians because while the revenue from iTMS sales is not that great, the publicity will drive more real CD sales.
Show me a player that can be controlled by the car audio controls, other than the iPod (coming straight from the factory, no third-party hacks). My guess is you can't. I agree that any player can pipe their output to a line-in on the car audio deck, but the only player with car audio control support is the iPod.
Given the fact that iPods represent nearly around 4 out of 5 portable music players sold, is it small wonder where there is a substantial cottage industry selling iPod accessories and why new car stereos now include connectors to connect to the iPod data connector so the car stereo can directly control the player and also charge the iPod's battery?
So I guess you're opposed to satellite radio too, then? Not to mention he also listed radio shows (podcasts) that are high quality and absolutely free to download. The podcasts are basically ad free, with a mention of sponsors at the beginning and end of shows, while the subscriptions are definitely ad free.
There are a lot of podcasts you can download for free all over the Internet. TwIT.tv's excellent podcasts barely scratch the surface of the many high-quality podcasts available out there; another very good one is TV Guide magazine's weekly podcast, one of the best podcasts about the TV and movie industry out there. For US$6.95 per month (about the cost of two Starbucks lattes!) you can get the ESPN Insider subscription, where you can download ESPN Radio's four weekday radio shows.
Apple fans are fine with paying more for apple products. They have put up with paying the Apple premium for years. It's just recently that that premium has actually been reduced to the point where they're quite competitive for the money you pay (just look at the MacBook).
While iPods do cost more, they've also pretty much "set the bar" for what a portable music player should be. Once you master using one most other portable music players seem less functional in comparison.
I think what soured 20th Century Fox and Universal from doing the Halo movie was the fact that Superman Returns did pretty poorly considering how much was spent on that movie! The ridiculous production costs of blockbuster movies makes studios nervous, and you will see a lot more far less expensive movies over the next few years.
If you want to listen to an iPod without unhealthy high volume, get yourself a decent set of in-ear headphones. The Sony MDR-EX51LP costs around US$40 and definitely worth it, since being a true in-ear design you can 1) listen to the iPod clearly at lower volume settings and 2) actually extend the battery charge time on the iPod since lower volume levels lessens battery drain.
Sure, if you want great sound quality you can use the Shure E2C or E3C in-ear headphones, but these Shure headphones are pretty expensive.
I think the iPod has impacted our world in the following ways:
1) It has pretty much consigned the old "boomboxes" to near-complete obsolescene (thank G** for that!). People now listen to their own music with generally not disturbing others in a package far more convenient than even the old cassette player Walkmans.
2) It has changed the way we buy music, by legitimizing music downloads.
3) It has actually made radio talk shows more popular, as many on-air talk shows are now available for subscription-based download (ESPN Radio's Radio Insider and Premiere Radio Networks' Streamlink programs for example). We are seeing rapid growth of specialized downloadable talk shows (This Week in Technology (TWiT) being one of the best examples of this).
4) It has made it far more practical to not have to carry around your Compact Discs when listening to music in the car. Thanks to increased storage capacity on today's players you can "rip" your CD collection at higher sample rates and still put quite a lot of music on a single player for car playback. Also, many cars now offer standard auxiliary 1/8" jack input for all portable music players and some even offer special connectors to connect your newer-generation iPod so you can control the iPod from the car stereo controls and/or recharge the iPod's battery at the same time.
But here's the question: when do you think the Mozilla Foundation releases the final version of Firefox 2.0? My guess is probably within the next seven days, especially now that they're up to Release Candidate 3.