NAT punching techniques used by Skype are not new, and certainly not invented by them. Voip providers back in the first internet bubble used them and i believe there are even some related patents filled in the '95-00 timeframe. Skype certainly improved on them and broght on the p2p aspect, instead of using one centralized coordination point. Apparently, they're still too centralized though, as this outage has demonstrated.
Both my current and my previous employers used to do this. Vacation, personal days, sick days are all lumped together into Paid Time Off. It is nice, as long as you have enough of it. With my previous employer I used to have 23 PTO days / year, not including holidays. Ah, the joys of working for a company with European roots:)
At&T uses HSPA at 1900Mhz in high density areas and 850Mhz in more rural areas, so you might be able to get some 3G service in cities. Europe is mostly 2100 with 900 installations occurring in a few places.
If a small mom and pop restaurant or a minor retailer is forced to collect taxes internet companies should be asked to collect taxes too.
Your argument is fallacious. Online stores do not compete with restaurants. Your minor retailer pays sales taxes in the state they're in, but can ship to 49 other states tax free. They have the same rights and obligations as the online retailer, which do collect sales taxes in the states in which they are located.
Talking about 10x or 20x is irrelevant. Ten times what? A 200-400mm lens is technically only 2x, but it goes further than any point and shoot camera. Most point and shoot cameras start at around 20-30mm and go to about 100-200mm focal distance, since that's the range most people want.
True, but that is only part of the reason. What hurts more is a poor regulatory environment that makes it prohibitive for parties outside established telecom carriers to enter the market. To give you an example, my father, who is a resident of Bucharest, Romania, started out in 2005 with a 4mbps/512kbps connection for about $20. He now pays about $9/mo for 50/50mbps and has a choice of about 3-4 other providers to go to, if need be. My choices here are between decent cable and pitiful DSL. There's an argument floating around that claims suburban sprawls cannot be wired as efficiently as a big city, but in that case, why do we have the same situation in places like NYC? They're dense, they're affluent so, by all accounts, should be enjoying blazing speeds for a pittance, but that's not the case.
$12/mo for 100Mbps full duplex fiber, uncapped worldwide Bucharest, Romania, Eastern Europe
Actually it's my dad's connection, and he has the 50mbps package for $9/mo. 100mbps is available, but he says 50 it's more than enough for his needs. Meanwhile, I pay $60/mo for 30/5 mbps here in the good ole US of A, the birthplace of the Internet.
Problem is you cannot find a full price, unlocked, contract-free phone that works on the US 3G frequency bands. Since they're different that EU bands, international versions of handsets will only work partially in the US (Edge only), and the ones that are designed specifically for the US are sold only through the carriers. There are exceptions, like Nexus One and Nokia N900, but that's about it. Although I hear that you can buy unlocked Iphones in Canada that will work on 850/1900 Mhz
Sprint's own network is pretty spotty and their roaming agreement with Verizon doesn't extend to EVDO data. Fine for voice, but kind of crappy for a data oriented smartphone.
The Galaxy S is another unknown entity. The specs I've seen claim UMTS 3G in the 900/1900/2100 bands, which is great for Europe but a poor fit for either AT&T and T-Mobile in the US (850 and 1700 respectively). I suspect the US version will be modified to work on the appropriate frequencies, but it remain to be seen. Also, Samsung has a reputation for not providing software updates once the phone is sold.
Unfortunately, the competitors are not up to par. My AT&T contract is set to expire in August and I am seriously considering switching away from Apple's Iphone. My choices as of right now are very few: Moto Droid X, which is not yet available, and is an unknown entity, HTC Evo 4G, with a crippled battery life and crippled network (Sprint); Nexus One, which is nice but 7 months old already and starting to show its age, plus you can only get it with a contract on T-mobile and finally Nokia N900 which is a brick and again, not available with a contract. Droid Incredible and the original Moto Droid are being phased out and have their own issues. Anything else does not even begin to compare.
I was really hoping that Apple would release another good one, but apparently Iphone 4 is a dud. So unless something better appears on the market in the meanwhile, I think I'll stick with my iphone 3G for now and wait for the next hardware rev.
Never accept a counter-offer. Chances are that they will replace you as soon as they can afterwards. If you're still considering staying there, ask for a raise before you put in your 2 weeks notice. If they value you, you'll get it.
Actually, this is a sign that AT&T is trying to get more customers into the smartphone bandwagon by reducing the price for casual data usage. Probably because the iphone market is saturated at the current price level. I don't think it indicates anything related to a non exclusive iphone... although I would love to see that happen.
New Jersey. No extreme weather, no tornadoes, no earthquakes, no volcanos and if you live 20 miles inland, you don't even need to worry about tsunamis when La Palma finally breaks apart and falls into the ocean.
Our government is another story though... but that would be a man-made disaster.
Cablevision's Optimum Ultra is rated at 101mbps. And they recommend a Gig-e router to get close to the rated speed. Docsis 3 standard is good for up to 171/343 mbps depending on the number of allocated channels so it's conceivable that most cable providers will be able to pass the 100 mbps barrier in the near future. So if one buys a router these days, it's a good idea to future proof it and get one that has gig-e ports.
They won't be in legal trouble if they return the phone, which they said they would. Say you find an unreleased iphone prototype. It would be reasonable to assume it belongs to Apple, but until they contact you and claim it, you don't know for sure. The thing didn't have a sticker on it stating it is Apple's property. It might as well been a fake device. I am not a lawyer but I think they're in the clear. They could not know for sure it was Apple's and they did post a "hey, device found" sign. On their website, publicly. Granted I'm sure that Apple would have preferred to keep it under wraps, but Gizmodo is under no contractual obligation to keep any Apple info confidential. Once Apple made an official request to have the phone returned, they gave it back (and got verification of authenticity in the process).
Bottom line is, i'm pretty sure they had a lawyer advise them through this whole deal.
I've been using Erlang as my primary language for the past 2 years and I have to say that you are essentially correct. My worst typo-leading-to-weird-bug situation was forgetting a comma in a list of strings. Apparently ["foo", "bar" "baz"] is interpreted as ["foo", "barbaz"]. That led to some subtle failures in a totally different part of the code.
However, occasional weird issues aside, it does reduce the size of the code and the number of bugs by a factor of 4 or 5. I have been able to write non-trivial pieces of code in the range of 100 lines that ran fine the first time around. That never happened with C/C++/Java. And the way Erlang and the OTP environment handles product deployments and maintenance is really superb.
The MBP is thinner, slightly lighter, comes in a unibody aluminum body, has longer battery life, magsafe, multitouch glass trackpad and better build quality. And OSX. This may not make up for the price differential for some people, but others think it is worth it. It's just a matter of personal preference, really. And budget, of course.
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And unlike T-Mobile, AT&T doesn't even unlock your phone for you after your contract has expired.
As far as I know, they do... except if your phone is an AT&T "exclusive" device. Which means the Iphone owners are out of luck.
NAT punching techniques used by Skype are not new, and certainly not invented by them. Voip providers back in the first internet bubble used them and i believe there are even some related patents filled in the '95-00 timeframe. Skype certainly improved on them and broght on the p2p aspect, instead of using one centralized coordination point. Apparently, they're still too centralized though, as this outage has demonstrated.
Both my current and my previous employers used to do this. Vacation, personal days, sick days are all lumped together into Paid Time Off. It is nice, as long as you have enough of it. With my previous employer I used to have 23 PTO days / year, not including holidays. Ah, the joys of working for a company with European roots :)
Replying to my own post: I just noticed that 1900Mhz is not supported by Nexus S, so no 3G service on At&T. Sorry.
At&T uses HSPA at 1900Mhz in high density areas and 850Mhz in more rural areas, so you might be able to get some 3G service in cities. Europe is mostly 2100 with 900 installations occurring in a few places.
If a small mom and pop restaurant or a minor retailer is forced to collect taxes internet companies should be asked to collect taxes too.
Your argument is fallacious. Online stores do not compete with restaurants. Your minor retailer pays sales taxes in the state they're in, but can ship to 49 other states tax free. They have the same rights and obligations as the online retailer, which do collect sales taxes in the states in which they are located.
Talking about 10x or 20x is irrelevant. Ten times what? A 200-400mm lens is technically only 2x, but it goes further than any point and shoot camera. Most point and shoot cameras start at around 20-30mm and go to about 100-200mm focal distance, since that's the range most people want.
As a Romanian, I can tell you that I couldn't care less who was behind it, the guy got what he deserved.
Only for voice. 3G data is not included in the roaming agreement
True, but that is only part of the reason. What hurts more is a poor regulatory environment that makes it prohibitive for parties outside established telecom carriers to enter the market. To give you an example, my father, who is a resident of Bucharest, Romania, started out in 2005 with a 4mbps/512kbps connection for about $20. He now pays about $9/mo for 50/50mbps and has a choice of about 3-4 other providers to go to, if need be. My choices here are between decent cable and pitiful DSL. There's an argument floating around that claims suburban sprawls cannot be wired as efficiently as a big city, but in that case, why do we have the same situation in places like NYC? They're dense, they're affluent so, by all accounts, should be enjoying blazing speeds for a pittance, but that's not the case.
$12/mo for 100Mbps full duplex fiber, uncapped worldwide
Bucharest, Romania, Eastern Europe
Actually it's my dad's connection, and he has the 50mbps package for $9/mo. 100mbps is available, but he says 50 it's more than enough for his needs.
Meanwhile, I pay $60/mo for 30/5 mbps here in the good ole US of A, the birthplace of the Internet.
Problem is you cannot find a full price, unlocked, contract-free phone that works on the US 3G frequency bands. Since they're different that EU bands, international versions of handsets will only work partially in the US (Edge only), and the ones that are designed specifically for the US are sold only through the carriers. There are exceptions, like Nexus One and Nokia N900, but that's about it. Although I hear that you can buy unlocked Iphones in Canada that will work on 850/1900 Mhz
Remove all the legal limitations to embryonic stem cell research and then we can compare results on an equal footing.
Sprint's own network is pretty spotty and their roaming agreement with Verizon doesn't extend to EVDO data. Fine for voice, but kind of crappy for a data oriented smartphone.
The Galaxy S is another unknown entity. The specs I've seen claim UMTS 3G in the 900/1900/2100 bands, which is great for Europe but a poor fit for either AT&T and T-Mobile in the US (850 and 1700 respectively). I suspect the US version will be modified to work on the appropriate frequencies, but it remain to be seen. Also, Samsung has a reputation for not providing software updates once the phone is sold.
Unfortunately, the competitors are not up to par. My AT&T contract is set to expire in August and I am seriously considering switching away from Apple's Iphone. My choices as of right now are very few: Moto Droid X, which is not yet available, and is an unknown entity, HTC Evo 4G, with a crippled battery life and crippled network (Sprint); Nexus One, which is nice but 7 months old already and starting to show its age, plus you can only get it with a contract on T-mobile and finally Nokia N900 which is a brick and again, not available with a contract. Droid Incredible and the original Moto Droid are being phased out and have their own issues. Anything else does not even begin to compare.
I was really hoping that Apple would release another good one, but apparently Iphone 4 is a dud. So unless something better appears on the market in the meanwhile, I think I'll stick with my iphone 3G for now and wait for the next hardware rev.
Except that you only need two, the third point is the one you're trying to find. Unless you're doing it in 3D.
Never accept a counter-offer. Chances are that they will replace you as soon as they can afterwards. If you're still considering staying there, ask for a raise before you put in your 2 weeks notice. If they value you, you'll get it.
Actually, this is a sign that AT&T is trying to get more customers into the smartphone bandwagon by reducing the price for casual data usage. Probably because the iphone market is saturated at the current price level. I don't think it indicates anything related to a non exclusive iphone... although I would love to see that happen.
New Jersey. No extreme weather, no tornadoes, no earthquakes, no volcanos and if you live 20 miles inland, you don't even need to worry about tsunamis when La Palma finally breaks apart and falls into the ocean.
Our government is another story though... but that would be a man-made disaster.
Cablevision's Optimum Ultra is rated at 101mbps. And they recommend a Gig-e router to get close to the rated speed. Docsis 3 standard is good for up to 171/343 mbps depending on the number of allocated channels so it's conceivable that most cable providers will be able to pass the 100 mbps barrier in the near future. So if one buys a router these days, it's a good idea to future proof it and get one that has gig-e ports.
Umm, what? Please visit an Eastern Orthodox church, you'll be surprised.
Yeah, that's a different thing. The engineer can definitely sue the crap out of them. Posting the article about him was definitely a dumb-headed move.
They won't be in legal trouble if they return the phone, which they said they would.
Say you find an unreleased iphone prototype. It would be reasonable to assume it belongs to Apple, but until they contact you and claim it, you don't know for sure. The thing didn't have a sticker on it stating it is Apple's property. It might as well been a fake device. I am not a lawyer but I think they're in the clear. They could not know for sure it was Apple's and they did post a "hey, device found" sign. On their website, publicly. Granted I'm sure that Apple would have preferred to keep it under wraps, but Gizmodo is under no contractual obligation to keep any Apple info confidential. Once Apple made an official request to have the phone returned, they gave it back (and got verification of authenticity in the process).
Bottom line is, i'm pretty sure they had a lawyer advise them through this whole deal.
I've been using Erlang as my primary language for the past 2 years and I have to say that you are essentially correct. My worst typo-leading-to-weird-bug situation was forgetting a comma in a list of strings. Apparently ["foo", "bar" "baz"] is interpreted as ["foo", "barbaz"]. That led to some subtle failures in a totally different part of the code.
However, occasional weird issues aside, it does reduce the size of the code and the number of bugs by a factor of 4 or 5. I have been able to write non-trivial pieces of code in the range of 100 lines that ran fine the first time around. That never happened with C/C++/Java. And the way Erlang and the OTP environment handles product deployments and maintenance is really superb.
The MBP is thinner, slightly lighter, comes in a unibody aluminum body, has longer battery life, magsafe, multitouch glass trackpad and better build quality. And OSX.
This may not make up for the price differential for some people, but others think it is worth it. It's just a matter of personal preference, really. And budget, of course.