What they need is to allow the stupid thing to transmit RAW format files - the feature that everyone wants, but for some bizarre reason they refuse to supply, even though it could be implemented very easily!
Not true. In particular, read and compare Sprint's terms of service vs. Verizon. I'm no Sprint fan, however, their TOS is much more lax. They seem to actually want you to use the service. In particular, they do not ban streaming media.
Seriously, why is Palm so cheap with the storage in this device? For the (IMO ridiculous) amount of money they ask for this device, users deserve perfection!
Well, as long as you're happy to pay Full Retail or a 'Substancial' Discount on only new merchandise from the kind of big companies that can afford a merchant account with a Credit Card company, you'll do fine.
Except that PayPal ends up costing just as much as it would to open a real merchant account... PayPal is very expensive for the recipient if you choose to accept credit card payments.
If you're selling lots of stuff, the idea that you can afford Paypal but not a real merchant account is absurd.
So the advantage to you is that you refuse to do business with the vendor unless they accept your credit card, and paypal allows them to accept your credit card.
Straight credit card vs. credit card via PayPal may sound similar, but they couldn't be more different. If I pay via the standard CC network and you defraud me, I can get my $ back by initiating a chargeback 99% of the time.
With Paypal, however, no such protection exists. The credit card companies won't issue chargebacks because PayPal is the vendor, not the person you're buying the item from, and PayPal provided the exact service you asked them to - sending funds to the seller. Thus no chargeback, and no consumer protection.
Love the Treo 600, had a chance to play with one, but can't justify the price. It's been out over a year and there really haven't been any big price drops.
You can buy a decent Sony Ericsson T610 phone for -$150 with a year's service committment, and buy a decent palm for $99 for a net cost of -$50.
Buy a Treo 600 instead and you have a net cost of at least $300 after activation, a difference of $350. WTF?
There's no way it costs $350 more to make a Treo 600 than a decent cell and palm. No wonder Palm stock is tanking! Everyone I know would buy one, but they've priced it out of reach of the vast majority of people.
What gives the FCC the right and or power to allow my cellular phone provider to modify the terms of my contract I have with that cellular provider? You can tell this story 100 different ways but bottom line, that is exactly what is happening here.
If your carrier adds a fee (as T-mobile just did) you can cancel your contract without penalty. Of course, they don't exactly advertise this fact, but it has happened with both T-mobile and Sprint in the last year. Check out some of the threads on Fatwallet.com about this issue.
Here in California, Verizon will not sell you DSL unless you also subscribe to voice service. I feel my DSL is fairly priced at $34 (for 768k service), but the requirement to have a voice line ($18 at least, if not more) makes it a much poorer value.
Is it like this everywhere? Anyway to get around this requirement? Like many folks, I use cellular exclusively, so it sucks to have to pay for a landline every month just to get broadband.
And don't give me any of that "your second-hand smoke hurts me" crap, as we all know that's a load of crap.
That's a load if I ever saw one. Go have a look at the incidence of childhood asthma among children with parents who smoke versus those who don't. Come back and let us know what you find.
Consider that the University of Wisconsin medical school estimates annual health care costs of $4.6 billion for treating the asthma, ear, and respiratory infections of kids living in smoking households.
I watched my girlfriend suffer for years living with a smoking parent. When they finally quit, the immediate improvement in her health was remarkable. Smoking affects no one but the smoker? Give me a break.
I used a Handspring Treo 180 PDA / phone for about a year and a half. I was a happy user, until the battery died. Like the iPod, it uses an integrated, non-user replaceable battery. I was eagerly awaiting the release of the Treo 600, Handsprings "newer, smaller, better" device. Only to find that it, too, uses a lame "integrated" battery. No thanks, Handspring. I bought a Sony Ericsson phone instead, and now I can get replacement batteries for $8 on eBay.
There is simply no reason these devices can't use replaceable batteries. Nokia, Ericcson, and Samsung have mastered the ability to create replaceable batteries that take up no extra space, are inexpensive, and work great. Why should these Apple and Handspring devices be any different? It's planned obselescence.
You don't put your product on sale unless you have some need to put it on sale.
Nonsense, Circuit City and the other "big box" chains would LOVE to discount the iPod. They can't because Apple will cut them off if they don't "play nice".
You read that right, it's 'for sale' at the *regular* price. Stores guilty of this include Best Buy, Circuit City, Target, and CompUSA.
As I'm sure others will point out, it is Apple that is the guilty party, not the retailers. A place like Circuit City would LOVE to discount the iPod, but their agreements with Apple prevent them from doing so.
Sure, they're free to sell them at any price that they want - except that Apple will cut them off.
Hasn't anyone else been noticing the number of in-show popup animations that push products and other shows during a program instead of during a commercial break?
Yep. I used to be a subscriber to "Center Ice", a multi-channel hockey package on DirecTV for about $150 a year. Loved it.
Then they started in with those stupid animated ads, covering up the live action of the hockey game! (Keep in mind, I'm paying for this content). Needless to say, this year I am not a subscriber.
I just installed iTunes for Windows on my computer. It suffers from quite a bit of lag when attempting to resize the window. I find this highly amusing - no other program on my Windows laptop suffers from this problem!
Very similar to the GUI lag that I've seen in various OS X releases. I used to think it was the slow hardware, but now it's pretty clear that it's just Apple's bloat.
It is 2003 - there is NO excuse for a program to lag when I do something as simple as resize the window!
Slightly offtopic, but broadband related - will I ever be able to get DSL service without having to have a voice number also? Or is that just my local Verizon sticking it to me?
I'd love to try a service like Vonage, but why bother when I already have to pay for a landline just to get DSL?
I'm disappointed that they went with the integrated battery again. A quick look at a Nokia shows that having a removable battery doesn't make the phone any larger at all, so why not have one?
I have a Treo 180 already, which also has the integrated battery. Not only can you not swap batteries to extend the phone's life (as you might on a business trip without opportunity to charge) but of course the charging lifespan of any battery is limited. Mine is starting to die... barely get one day's use out of it now before it must be charged.
You ever stop to think that maybe the professor doesn't have time to email,call,talk to 500 kiddies that are trying to save a few bux on books at the expense of their non-existant time? They submit their list to the bookstore. They shouldn't have to submit their list to 500 other winers.
You know, you're right. It would be so difficult for the professor to stick a sheet of paper on their office door with the name of the textbook on it. Wouldn't want to burden them...
No one should feel bad about taking information from a college bookstore and then buying elsewhere. College bookstores, and the textbook industry in general, are slimy.
Here's an example of slimy university bookstore tactics: Obviously, the professors must tell the bookstore what texts they'll be using far in advance so that the bookstore may order them, right? Previously, you could go in the bookstore two weeks before the semester started, look at the tag to see what books were planned for your class, and then order them online. They'd get there in time for your class and you'd have the book on the first day.
The bookstore can't have that, of course, so now they won't publish the lists until school is about to start. So now you can't order online ahead of time because no one will tell you what books are being used!
The professors are in on it, of course. If you approach them a few weeks ahead of time and ask what books will be used, they will only refer you to the bookstore. If you decide to wait until the first day and then order online, you're further screwed because the professor gives an assignment due at the next class meeting and you'll never get your online order in time.
Yet another device that looks cool until you find out it has no built in speaker - they expect you to plug in a headset cable each time you want to make/receive a call.
No one I know could use a mobile phone that way - who's buying these things?
Whatever you do, avoid Cingular. They've recently decided that it's okay to spam customers via SMS with their marketing garbage... even if you "opt-out". Life's too short to be PAYING someone to spam me.
Anyway, once number portability is here, I'm gone. Which providers DON'T spam their own customers?
Re:An explaination for non-bike-geeks
on
Bamboo Bike A Reality
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· Score: 2, Informative
I think you mean it's a "fixed gear" not a singlespeed. There are certainly plenty of singlespeed bikes (bikes with one gear) that aren't fixed. In fact, the majority of them are not fixed gears (i.e., you can coast).
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What they need is to allow the stupid thing to transmit RAW format files - the feature that everyone wants, but for some bizarre reason they refuse to supply, even though it could be implemented very easily!
Not true. In particular, read and compare Sprint's terms of service vs. Verizon. I'm no Sprint fan, however, their TOS is much more lax. They seem to actually want you to use the service. In particular, they do not ban streaming media.
Seriously, why is Palm so cheap with the storage in this device? For the (IMO ridiculous) amount of money they ask for this device, users deserve perfection!
Except that PayPal ends up costing just as much as it would to open a real merchant account... PayPal is very expensive for the recipient if you choose to accept credit card payments.
If you're selling lots of stuff, the idea that you can afford Paypal but not a real merchant account is absurd.
Straight credit card vs. credit card via PayPal may sound similar, but they couldn't be more different. If I pay via the standard CC network and you defraud me, I can get my $ back by initiating a chargeback 99% of the time.
With Paypal, however, no such protection exists. The credit card companies won't issue chargebacks because PayPal is the vendor, not the person you're buying the item from, and PayPal provided the exact service you asked them to - sending funds to the seller. Thus no chargeback, and no consumer protection.
Anyone know why? It seems like such a useful service otherwise, saving a trip to the post office to buy a money order.
You can buy a decent Sony Ericsson T610 phone for -$150 with a year's service committment, and buy a decent palm for $99 for a net cost of -$50.
Buy a Treo 600 instead and you have a net cost of at least $300 after activation, a difference of $350. WTF?
There's no way it costs $350 more to make a Treo 600 than a decent cell and palm. No wonder Palm stock is tanking! Everyone I know would buy one, but they've priced it out of reach of the vast majority of people.
If your carrier adds a fee (as T-mobile just did) you can cancel your contract without penalty. Of course, they don't exactly advertise this fact, but it has happened with both T-mobile and Sprint in the last year. Check out some of the threads on Fatwallet.com about this issue.
... and you don't have a voice number on that line? When you call Covad for help they don't ask "what's your phone number?"
Is it like this everywhere? Anyway to get around this requirement? Like many folks, I use cellular exclusively, so it sucks to have to pay for a landline every month just to get broadband.
That's a load if I ever saw one. Go have a look at the incidence of childhood asthma among children with parents who smoke versus those who don't. Come back and let us know what you find.
Consider that the University of Wisconsin medical school estimates annual health care costs of $4.6 billion for treating the asthma, ear, and respiratory infections of kids living in smoking households.
I watched my girlfriend suffer for years living with a smoking parent. When they finally quit, the immediate improvement in her health was remarkable. Smoking affects no one but the smoker? Give me a break.
There is simply no reason these devices can't use replaceable batteries. Nokia, Ericcson, and Samsung have mastered the ability to create replaceable batteries that take up no extra space, are inexpensive, and work great. Why should these Apple and Handspring devices be any different? It's planned obselescence.
Nonsense, Circuit City and the other "big box" chains would LOVE to discount the iPod. They can't because Apple will cut them off if they don't "play nice".
As I'm sure others will point out, it is Apple that is the guilty party, not the retailers. A place like Circuit City would LOVE to discount the iPod, but their agreements with Apple prevent them from doing so.
Sure, they're free to sell them at any price that they want - except that Apple will cut them off.
Yep. I used to be a subscriber to "Center Ice", a multi-channel hockey package on DirecTV for about $150 a year. Loved it.
Then they started in with those stupid animated ads, covering up the live action of the hockey game! (Keep in mind, I'm paying for this content). Needless to say, this year I am not a subscriber.
Very similar to the GUI lag that I've seen in various OS X releases. I used to think it was the slow hardware, but now it's pretty clear that it's just Apple's bloat.
It is 2003 - there is NO excuse for a program to lag when I do something as simple as resize the window!
Benchmarks aside, does the GUI of OS X still lag? What CPU speed is necessary on the Mac side in order for the GUI to be as responsive as Windows?
I'd love to try a service like Vonage, but why bother when I already have to pay for a landline just to get DSL?
I have a Treo 180 already, which also has the integrated battery. Not only can you not swap batteries to extend the phone's life (as you might on a business trip without opportunity to charge) but of course the charging lifespan of any battery is limited. Mine is starting to die... barely get one day's use out of it now before it must be charged.
You know, you're right. It would be so difficult for the professor to stick a sheet of paper on their office door with the name of the textbook on it. Wouldn't want to burden them...
Here's an example of slimy university bookstore tactics: Obviously, the professors must tell the bookstore what texts they'll be using far in advance so that the bookstore may order them, right? Previously, you could go in the bookstore two weeks before the semester started, look at the tag to see what books were planned for your class, and then order them online. They'd get there in time for your class and you'd have the book on the first day.
The bookstore can't have that, of course, so now they won't publish the lists until school is about to start. So now you can't order online ahead of time because no one will tell you what books are being used!
The professors are in on it, of course. If you approach them a few weeks ahead of time and ask what books will be used, they will only refer you to the bookstore. If you decide to wait until the first day and then order online, you're further screwed because the professor gives an assignment due at the next class meeting and you'll never get your online order in time.
No one I know could use a mobile phone that way - who's buying these things?
Anyway, once number portability is here, I'm gone. Which providers DON'T spam their own customers?
I think you mean it's a "fixed gear" not a singlespeed. There are certainly plenty of singlespeed bikes (bikes with one gear) that aren't fixed. In fact, the majority of them are not fixed gears (i.e., you can coast).
wish we had this in California... I'm tired of paying Verizon for a voice line (that I don't use) just so I can get DSL service.