> I'm surprised Backblaze has published so much without getting into lawsuit trouble already.
Hopefully "the truth" is a valid defense?:-) Plus I think the drive companies are aware of the "Streisand effect" https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/... and don't want to call even more attention to the fact that every hard drive is fully expected to fail eventually.
You might be surprised how little discount we get. Our last purchase of 4 TByte Hitachi drives (960 drives in one purchase) we paid $135 each before tax and shipping. "B&H Photo" sometimes wins the bid (I don't know how or why), but you can basically get that same price within a couple bucks in units of 1 or 2 from their website. Note: we have no affiliation with B&H other than satisfied customers, and B&H do not win the bid every time.
With that said, if anybody knows how to get more than $2 off "retail" please PLEASE let us know!!
> Their backup scheme require them to have access to your private key (the one you encrypted your backup with).
Disclaimer: I'm a Backblaze engineer who wrote a lot of that code.
Your statement is a bit misleading, there are two levels of security in Backblaze. Data is always encrypted, and the "private key" is a totally standard OpenSSL PEM file that yes, we store for you. By default, this PEM file is secured by a passphrase that Backblaze knows, so your data is essentially only secured by your email address and password and you can recover your password by email. This is pretty light security (if somebody has access to your email they can recover your password), so it's best for backups of stuff you wouldn't mind too much if somebody got ahold of it, like say pictures of your cat. Don't laugh, I backup my public website on Backblaze servers, there is valuable data in the world that does not need encryption, that would be info you don't want to lose but is ALSO publicly readable.
So if you are concerned at all about security, you can set your own personal "passphrase" on that PEM file that Backblaze absolutely never writes to disk - we don't store it. But if you do this you MUST remember that passphrase or your data is GONE. Without that passphrase, nobody will ever retrieve your data, not you, not the US government, not the NSA, NOBODY. You cannot "recover" that passphrase, and we don't know it. This is a good mode of security if you would be arrested on the spot for the contents of your files if the NSA got ahold of your data, because we really don't think it is breakable.
We do these drive statistics and observations originally for our own selfish internal reasons - this is information that is important for running our business. When we then release this kind of information, the info release is largely because it helps people hear about our company (and also maybe a little of "good for humanity" motivation thrown in there, we're Slashdot kind of people, we work in technology in Silicon Valley). But let me be clear: the information is as accurate as we can possibly make it, and we aren't pulling any punches and we aren't "in bed with" any drive manufacturers. I see this as a WIN-WIN. You get accurate and free information, and a few people hear our company name and look into what we do and maybe we gain a few customers. These posts are often written by the engineers working on the system and are trying to be as straight-forward and non-marketing as we can be.
Are you sure? An average iPhone JPEG is only 2 MBytes or so, right? That means your wife is taking 50,000 photos a month? That's 2 photos per minute every minute she is awake, if I did the math correctly.
> They've repeatedly published their research openly... just in case anyone cares.
"Research" sounds too official, more like "observations in our environment", but THANK YOU for the kind words. What baffles me is why nobody else publishes these sorts of drive statistics. Why is Amazon silent? Why doesn't Google name drive names and failure rates? And if the answer is: "Google gets a great price on drives in exchange for their silence" then why hasn't Backblaze been offered a deal to keep quiet yet?! I'm serious, how big do you have to get before you get the better prices on drives? We essentially pay "retail".
> the amount of cheerleading for Uber is ridiculous
Or maybe Uber is that much better than the old days (10 years ago Taxi situation)? Seriously, when I hear person after person rave about how a service or restaurant is good or convenient, I give it a try. So I tried Uber, and it was wonderful. Now I've had better and worse Uber rides, I'm no Uber shill. But over all it simply is better than Taxi service was 10 years ago, it solves ALL my main complaints.
Now I've heard the Taxi services admit they had dropped the ball and they are addressing their issues, I even heard they have Smartphone apps now. Well to some extent: screw them! I'm loyal to Uber now. Taxi's made their bed, they can lie in it and die as far as I'm concerned. As long as every time I call an Uber it shows up on my smartphone and I can watch it approach me - I'm ordering Uber. Now, if Uber service starts sucking as bad as Taxis did then I'll evaluate my choices again at that point.
Disclaimer: I work at Backblaze. Essentially this is what we did. We don't care at all if one drive dies, so we left it in an environment where we can read and write them all day (the storage pods with live customer data) and when they failed we calmly replaced them with zero customer data loss and produced this blog post.:-)
> power-cycling the drive can have an effect on its lifetime and/or reliability
Yes, exactly, why are you calling this stupid? It is interesting because it might affect your behavior - if you power cycle the drives every day, maybe you should consider leaving them powered up, if electricity is cheaper than replacing the drive. It's just an observation, leaving it out seems.... irresponsible? Disclaimer: I work at Backblaze.
Neither Apple nor Microsoft have popup warnings built into the OS you get from the factory telling you anything of value that the drive in your laptop has actually lost data, or might lose data. Heck, without a bunch of configuration I don't think Linux does either?
I just cannot imagine how Apple and Microsoft can justify not warning users when they are about to lose a drive, or when data was ACTUALLY LOST but they just keep pretending the disk was fixed up and don't tell you what was lost. Meanwhile they provide silly rewrites making the GUI more flat, a purely cosmetic change. How about providing real value and more data integrity at a file system level?
> TL;DR: Buy whatever is cheapest, the odds are always the same.
Disclaimer: I work at Backblaze. I'm going to completely agree with you wholeheartedly, and say in addition you must have a backup. You don't have to use us, I'm just saying if a drive has a 1 percent chance or a 30 percent chance of failing, the actionable item is the same - keep a backup and buy the cheaper drive and restore from backup when it happens.
> over the past 10 years, I've never had a hard drive die in any of my computers while in use.
Professionally we lose something like 10 (?) drives every single day at Backblaze, but *PERSONALLY* I had a LOT of luck for a number of years, but about 3 years ago I finally lost one drive. I'm more backed up than most people, so it was a completely relaxed event. Not a bit of stress. Replace the drive, re-install the OS, and restore the data. Yet something like 95 percent of people never backup their data. IT professionals backup up their family computers, but once you are out there in "normal computer user" land, it's a horror show.
What old world do you live in? Everybody text messages now (or uses Snapchat or Whatsapp or whatever), very few people ever "talk" on a phone. Watch what happens today as the plane lands and the announcement goes out that it is ok to use phones. Of 100 people, maybe 50 quietly text their friends to come pick them up at baggage claim, and one old guy makes a fast, quiet actual call saying in an embarrassed tone "Yeah, it's me, I just landed." Then he hangs up.
But personally (as a tall wide guy) I think a few "size bumps" for extra fees would be very welcome. For example, an extra $10 for an extra inch of legroom, and another $10 for an additional inch of width. The fact is space is money, and small children and petite woman fit JUST FINE in the smallest seats and should get a price break for it.
> Fukushima's error was they didn't raise the sea wall
Also, the backup generators to operate pumps were in the basement that flooded. If the generators had been on the roof, it would have been fine.
I know hindsight is always easy, but it does seem like important stuff in a flood plain should be inspected and thought through once per year by smart people to find glaring problems like this.
Our graphics designer who does a lot of video work got a Mac Pro here at work, they are pretty expensive, but it seems fast and reliable so far. Time will tell for sure.
> you can't put a mechanical drive inside, which limits performance for video editing
I think the designers made the correct decisions for video editing. SSDs are faster than mechanical drives and go inside. Most video editors also need large repositories in addition to their working set (the working set goes on internal SSD) and basically always use external mechanical disk arrays - and the Mac Pro comes with nice fast Thunderbolt for the external arrays.
I dislike the humongous cases of a few years ago, I welcome smaller, more practical, more desk friendly designs just as long as they are every bit as fast.
My toothbrush has charged wirelessly for 15 years. My MacBook Air has a magnetic recharging cable, which is really nice (SOOOO much better than the micro USB on my phone). I previously had a phone that had both magnetic connector charging AND inductive charging in a tiny phone (HP Veer) proving it is possible and practical. I'm utterly baffled by why these two options aren't preferred everywhere. We have existence proofs, everybody that uses them loves them, what is the hold up?
In practice, the insurance companies find ways to increase your out of pocket, or just outright not pay. Let me give my personal example.
I have a medical issue where I will be on a certain drug for the rest of my life. The issue is completely taken care of by this drug, and all medical literature that I can find (and my doctor) says this is the correct treatment. After a year of insurance paying for the drug smoothly, I arrive at the pharmacy and insurance is no longer paying. The insurance company says my "pre approval" has expired and that process takes a week Ok, since I could die without my medication, I pay cash out of pocket. Meanwhile, my doctor calls them for "pre approval", and supposedly it is cleared up. A month goes by, I show up in the pharmacy, the insurance company will only pay for half the dosage. So I pay cash for half, and call my doctor, who says they applied correctly, the insurance company made a mistake, and they will reapply for "pre approval". Boom, I've exceeded my "supposedly" out of pocket max. Welcome to my world of the insurance company refuses to pay by being difficult and sleazy and slow.
So in practice, there is this new part of the system nobody is warning us about. Everybody thinks if the treatment is well understood and your doctor prescribes the treatment then the insurance company MUST PAY, but this is not true. The insurance company can (and regularly does) simply refuse to pay AT THE LAST MINUTE WITH NO WARNING because . Side note: sometimes the reason is there is a cheaper, yet less effective treatment, I ran into that for a DIFFERENT medication once. But my doctor cannot possibly seem to check this in advance? I always find out at the pharmacy at the final moment as I attempt to leave with the drug?
Don't misunderstand me, I do not have a solution for health care, I don't know if single payer would be better or worse, I don't know how to lower costs, and there may not exist a better system than what we have now. But I do know I dislike the current system, it feels antiquated and inefficient. My pharmacy, doctor, and insurance company use FAX to communicate. FAX?! There is no ticketing system where I can keep the pre approval moving along, or where I can double check the final outcome. And it seems clear to me the insurance company is overstepping their bounds. When you get a correct, legitimate prescription, they should pay, but that is not the current system.
You are absolutely correct for DIRECT NON-STOP flights. But many or most international flights have connections and layovers. I live on the west coast, usually I fly to New York or Chicago and catch my connection overseas there - often with a dead laptop battery.
Luckily more and more it is possible to find recharging plugs in airports. But if the TSA weren't being complete jerks, they would provide a completely (USA) standard 110 V power plug on an extension cord right at security. I don't know anybody who flies internationally without their device chargers. But this is the same TSA that refuses to sell you $1 stamped envelopes to put your pocket knife into so you can US mail it to yourself. Or simply "hold" your pocket knife for 48 hours since you will be back in this exact same airport when you return tomorrow. Nope, it is really, REALLY important to run TSA badly and punish innocent people - so they will NOT be providing an electrical plug to allow you to save your $700 phone or $1,500 laptop.
I see the need for a package delivery system (I love internet shopping myself), but I'll bet 99 percent of the USPS deliveries by weight is printed paper. I say shut the USPS down completely and let UPS and FedEx and DHL take up the small slack in package delivery left by the USPS shutdown.
Several people have brought up the cost and barrier to entry of email. Email service is essentially free (gmail, hotmail, yahoo mail) and free WiFi is not that hard to come by. Maybe I'm jaded living in Silicon Valley but all of Mountain View has free WiFi, most libraries and coffee shops provide it, etc. I suppose the main cost is renting $2 worth of computer time at a Kinkos if you are homeless and want to send an email.
But I'm definitely a believer in social safety nets. Currently, I believe there is a tax on every land line phone that goes to supplying "universal lifeline access" to poor people. I would personally vote for a system that as of age 18, every man or woman who was at or below poverty level would be provided a low end SmartPhone for free every 3 years and a basic data plan enough to send and receive email. Coupled with decommissioning 9/10ths of the US post office it probably would save money.
I agree quick communication is the mark of an advanced society, but refusing to upgrade when better options are available is the mark of a doomed society.
When daily physical mail was first invented, it was great. But now that we have cell phones, email, faxes, SMS messages, Slashdot discussions, surely you can see daily physical mail is now SLOWER and less advanced for most messages.
When the first person put a horse shoe on a horse it was an advancement. But when we have cars, subways, trains, etc you have to finally admit horse shoes WERE a good idea, but now you should be using rubber tires on cars.
Any one computer doesn't have to survive longer than a human lifespan if you can transfer files between computers and backup. I have taken many digital pictures in my life, they have been taken with ever increasing quality and the sum total of all pictures has been stored on ever larger and faster laptops. I can afford a new laptop every 2 years, so laptop failures have all been really expected and yet still totally Ok.
> companies which obtained software patents, a direct attack
> on the freedom of programmers everywhere
Obtaining patents is not a direct attack, initiating a lawsuit using
patents is the aggression step.
At every large company I worked at (Apple, HP, SGI) they
told us to help patent "stuff" as a defensive measure. I don't see anything wrong
with accepting we live in an imperfect world where somebody very evil
might threaten us and try to shut us down for evil reasons.
So you build big tall walls and stock supplies and gunpowder
hoping to never use them.
Patent TROLLS are the aggressors, do you blame these companies
for planning ahead and preparing to defend themselves from bullies?
Here is a slightly longer list of companies that have sold us (Backblaze) hard drive recently:
B&H Video
CTI-Computech International
Central Computers
Kingstar
NVS Systems
Upgrade Express (might have changed their name?)
We have "farmed" from Costo, Best Buy, and Amazon within the last 6 months. This is where individuals buy "sales item" hard drives. So if you watch for sales, you are are probably getting as good as a price as Backblaze gets.
Slashdot Mirror
> I'm surprised Backblaze has published so much without getting into lawsuit trouble already.
:-) Plus I think the drive companies are aware of the "Streisand effect" https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/... and don't want to call even more attention to the fact that every hard drive is fully expected to fail eventually.
Hopefully "the truth" is a valid defense?
> retail at the 10,000 drive order level
You might be surprised how little discount we get. Our last purchase of 4 TByte Hitachi drives (960 drives in one purchase) we paid $135 each before tax and shipping. "B&H Photo" sometimes wins the bid (I don't know how or why), but you can basically get that same price within a couple bucks in units of 1 or 2 from their website. Note: we have no affiliation with B&H other than satisfied customers, and B&H do not win the bid every time.
With that said, if anybody knows how to get more than $2 off "retail" please PLEASE let us know!!
> Their backup scheme require them to have access to your private key (the one you encrypted your backup with).
Disclaimer: I'm a Backblaze engineer who wrote a lot of that code.
Your statement is a bit misleading, there are two levels of security in Backblaze. Data is always encrypted, and the "private key" is a totally standard OpenSSL PEM file that yes, we store for you. By default, this PEM file is secured by a passphrase that Backblaze knows, so your data is essentially only secured by your email address and password and you can recover your password by email. This is pretty light security (if somebody has access to your email they can recover your password), so it's best for backups of stuff you wouldn't mind too much if somebody got ahold of it, like say pictures of your cat. Don't laugh, I backup my public website on Backblaze servers, there is valuable data in the world that does not need encryption, that would be info you don't want to lose but is ALSO publicly readable.
So if you are concerned at all about security, you can set your own personal "passphrase" on that PEM file that Backblaze absolutely never writes to disk - we don't store it. But if you do this you MUST remember that passphrase or your data is GONE. Without that passphrase, nobody will ever retrieve your data, not you, not the US government, not the NSA, NOBODY. You cannot "recover" that passphrase, and we don't know it. This is a good mode of security if you would be arrested on the spot for the contents of your files if the NSA got ahold of your data, because we really don't think it is breakable.
Disclaimer: I'm an engineer at Backblaze.
We do these drive statistics and observations originally for our own selfish internal reasons - this is information that is important for running our business. When we then release this kind of information, the info release is largely because it helps people hear about our company (and also maybe a little of "good for humanity" motivation thrown in there, we're Slashdot kind of people, we work in technology in Silicon Valley). But let me be clear: the information is as accurate as we can possibly make it, and we aren't pulling any punches and we aren't "in bed with" any drive manufacturers. I see this as a WIN-WIN. You get accurate and free information, and a few people hear our company name and look into what we do and maybe we gain a few customers. These posts are often written by the engineers working on the system and are trying to be as straight-forward and non-marketing as we can be.
> recreational photos take 100 GBytes per month
Are you sure? An average iPhone JPEG is only 2 MBytes or so, right? That means your wife is taking 50,000 photos a month? That's 2 photos per minute every minute she is awake, if I did the math correctly.
Disclaimer: I work at Backblaze.
> They've repeatedly published their research openly... just in case anyone cares.
"Research" sounds too official, more like "observations in our environment", but THANK YOU for the kind words. What baffles me is why nobody else publishes these sorts of drive statistics. Why is Amazon silent? Why doesn't Google name drive names and failure rates? And if the answer is: "Google gets a great price on drives in exchange for their silence" then why hasn't Backblaze been offered a deal to keep quiet yet?! I'm serious, how big do you have to get before you get the better prices on drives? We essentially pay "retail".
> the amount of cheerleading for Uber is ridiculous
Or maybe Uber is that much better than the old days (10 years ago Taxi situation)? Seriously, when I hear person after person rave about how a service or restaurant is good or convenient, I give it a try. So I tried Uber, and it was wonderful. Now I've had better and worse Uber rides, I'm no Uber shill. But over all it simply is better than Taxi service was 10 years ago, it solves ALL my main complaints.
Now I've heard the Taxi services admit they had dropped the ball and they are addressing their issues, I even heard they have Smartphone apps now. Well to some extent: screw them! I'm loyal to Uber now. Taxi's made their bed, they can lie in it and die as far as I'm concerned. As long as every time I call an Uber it shows up on my smartphone and I can watch it approach me - I'm ordering Uber. Now, if Uber service starts sucking as bad as Taxis did then I'll evaluate my choices again at that point.
Disclaimer: I work at Backblaze. Essentially this is what we did. We don't care at all if one drive dies, so we left it in an environment where we can read and write them all day (the storage pods with live customer data) and when they failed we calmly replaced them with zero customer data loss and produced this blog post. :-)
> power-cycling the drive can have an effect on its lifetime and/or reliability
Yes, exactly, why are you calling this stupid? It is interesting because it might affect your behavior - if you power cycle the drives every day, maybe you should consider leaving them powered up, if electricity is cheaper than replacing the drive. It's just an observation, leaving it out seems.... irresponsible? Disclaimer: I work at Backblaze.
Disclaimer: I work at Backblaze.
> SMART values they expected to be an indication on drive wear showed no correlation with failure
Exactly. Also, some people care more than "approximately correlates" vs seeing the actual data of exactly how correlated it is.
Neither Apple nor Microsoft have popup warnings built into the OS you get from the factory telling you anything of value that the drive in your laptop has actually lost data, or might lose data. Heck, without a bunch of configuration I don't think Linux does either?
I just cannot imagine how Apple and Microsoft can justify not warning users when they are about to lose a drive, or when data was ACTUALLY LOST but they just keep pretending the disk was fixed up and don't tell you what was lost. Meanwhile they provide silly rewrites making the GUI more flat, a purely cosmetic change. How about providing real value and more data integrity at a file system level?
> TL;DR: Buy whatever is cheapest, the odds are always the same.
Disclaimer: I work at Backblaze. I'm going to completely agree with you wholeheartedly, and say in addition you must have a backup. You don't have to use us, I'm just saying if a drive has a 1 percent chance or a 30 percent chance of failing, the actionable item is the same - keep a backup and buy the cheaper drive and restore from backup when it happens.
> over the past 10 years, I've never had a hard drive die in any of my computers while in use.
Professionally we lose something like 10 (?) drives every single day at Backblaze, but *PERSONALLY* I had a LOT of luck for a number of years, but about 3 years ago I finally lost one drive. I'm more backed up than most people, so it was a completely relaxed event. Not a bit of stress. Replace the drive, re-install the OS, and restore the data. Yet something like 95 percent of people never backup their data. IT professionals backup up their family computers, but once you are out there in "normal computer user" land, it's a horror show.
> an entire plane of people yakking on the phone
What old world do you live in? Everybody text messages now (or uses Snapchat or Whatsapp or whatever), very few people ever "talk" on a phone. Watch what happens today as the plane lands and the announcement goes out that it is ok to use phones. Of 100 people, maybe 50 quietly text their friends to come pick them up at baggage claim, and one old guy makes a fast, quiet actual call saying in an embarrassed tone "Yeah, it's me, I just landed." Then he hangs up.
> dimensions of space aren't listed
Always available now at http://www.seatguru.com/
But personally (as a tall wide guy) I think a few "size bumps" for extra fees would be very welcome. For example, an extra $10 for an extra inch of legroom, and another $10 for an additional inch of width. The fact is space is money, and small children and petite woman fit JUST FINE in the smallest seats and should get a price break for it.
> Fukushima's error was they didn't raise the sea wall
Also, the backup generators to operate pumps were in the basement that flooded. If the generators had been on the roof, it would have been fine.
I know hindsight is always easy, but it does seem like important stuff in a flood plain should be inspected and thought through once per year by smart people to find glaring problems like this.
Our graphics designer who does a lot of video work got a Mac Pro here at work, they are pretty expensive, but it seems fast and reliable so far. Time will tell for sure.
> you can't put a mechanical drive inside, which limits performance for video editing
I think the designers made the correct decisions for video editing. SSDs are faster than mechanical drives and go inside. Most video editors also need large repositories in addition to their working set (the working set goes on internal SSD) and basically always use external mechanical disk arrays - and the Mac Pro comes with nice fast Thunderbolt for the external arrays.
I dislike the humongous cases of a few years ago, I welcome smaller, more practical, more desk friendly designs just as long as they are every bit as fast.
My toothbrush has charged wirelessly for 15 years. My MacBook Air has a magnetic recharging cable, which is really nice (SOOOO much better than the micro USB on my phone). I previously had a phone that had both magnetic connector charging AND inductive charging in a tiny phone (HP Veer) proving it is possible and practical. I'm utterly baffled by why these two options aren't preferred everywhere. We have existence proofs, everybody that uses them loves them, what is the hold up?
> after the $6,500 max, all expenses are paid
In practice, the insurance companies find ways to increase your out of pocket, or just outright not pay. Let me give my personal example.
I have a medical issue where I will be on a certain drug for the rest of my life. The issue is completely taken care of by this drug, and all medical literature that I can find (and my doctor) says this is the correct treatment. After a year of insurance paying for the drug smoothly, I arrive at the pharmacy and insurance is no longer paying. The insurance company says my "pre approval" has expired and that process takes a week Ok, since I could die without my medication, I pay cash out of pocket. Meanwhile, my doctor calls them for "pre approval", and supposedly it is cleared up. A month goes by, I show up in the pharmacy, the insurance company will only pay for half the dosage. So I pay cash for half, and call my doctor, who says they applied correctly, the insurance company made a mistake, and they will reapply for "pre approval". Boom, I've exceeded my "supposedly" out of pocket max. Welcome to my world of the insurance company refuses to pay by being difficult and sleazy and slow.
So in practice, there is this new part of the system nobody is warning us about. Everybody thinks if the treatment is well understood and your doctor prescribes the treatment then the insurance company MUST PAY, but this is not true. The insurance company can (and regularly does) simply refuse to pay AT THE LAST MINUTE WITH NO WARNING because . Side note: sometimes the reason is there is a cheaper, yet less effective treatment, I ran into that for a DIFFERENT medication once. But my doctor cannot possibly seem to check this in advance? I always find out at the pharmacy at the final moment as I attempt to leave with the drug?
Don't misunderstand me, I do not have a solution for health care, I don't know if single payer would be better or worse, I don't know how to lower costs, and there may not exist a better system than what we have now. But I do know I dislike the current system, it feels antiquated and inefficient. My pharmacy, doctor, and insurance company use FAX to communicate. FAX?! There is no ticketing system where I can keep the pre approval moving along, or where I can double check the final outcome. And it seems clear to me the insurance company is overstepping their bounds. When you get a correct, legitimate prescription, they should pay, but that is not the current system.
You are absolutely correct for DIRECT NON-STOP flights. But many or most international flights have connections and layovers. I live on the west coast, usually I fly to New York or Chicago and catch my connection overseas there - often with a dead laptop battery.
Luckily more and more it is possible to find recharging plugs in airports. But if the TSA weren't being complete jerks, they would provide a completely (USA) standard 110 V power plug on an extension cord right at security. I don't know anybody who flies internationally without their device chargers. But this is the same TSA that refuses to sell you $1 stamped envelopes to put your pocket knife into so you can US mail it to yourself. Or simply "hold" your pocket knife for 48 hours since you will be back in this exact same airport when you return tomorrow. Nope, it is really, REALLY important to run TSA badly and punish innocent people - so they will NOT be providing an electrical plug to allow you to save your $700 phone or $1,500 laptop.
I see the need for a package delivery system (I love internet shopping myself), but I'll bet 99 percent of the USPS deliveries by weight is printed paper. I say shut the USPS down completely and let UPS and FedEx and DHL take up the small slack in package delivery left by the USPS shutdown.
Several people have brought up the cost and barrier to entry of email. Email service is essentially free (gmail, hotmail, yahoo mail) and free WiFi is not that hard to come by. Maybe I'm jaded living in Silicon Valley but all of Mountain View has free WiFi, most libraries and coffee shops provide it, etc. I suppose the main cost is renting $2 worth of computer time at a Kinkos if you are homeless and want to send an email.
But I'm definitely a believer in social safety nets. Currently, I believe there is a tax on every land line phone that goes to supplying "universal lifeline access" to poor people. I would personally vote for a system that as of age 18, every man or woman who was at or below poverty level would be provided a low end SmartPhone for free every 3 years and a basic data plan enough to send and receive email. Coupled with decommissioning 9/10ths of the US post office it probably would save money.
I agree quick communication is the mark of an advanced society, but refusing to upgrade when better options are available is the mark of a doomed society.
When daily physical mail was first invented, it was great. But now that we have cell phones, email, faxes, SMS messages, Slashdot discussions, surely you can see daily physical mail is now SLOWER and less advanced for most messages.
When the first person put a horse shoe on a horse it was an advancement. But when we have cars, subways, trains, etc you have to finally admit horse shoes WERE a good idea, but now you should be using rubber tires on cars.
Any one computer doesn't have to survive longer than a human lifespan if you can transfer files between computers and backup. I have taken many digital pictures in my life, they have been taken with ever increasing quality and the sum total of all pictures has been stored on ever larger and faster laptops. I can afford a new laptop every 2 years, so laptop failures have all been really expected and yet still totally Ok.
> companies which obtained software patents, a direct attack
> on the freedom of programmers everywhere
Obtaining patents is not a direct attack, initiating a lawsuit using patents is the aggression step.
At every large company I worked at (Apple, HP, SGI) they told us to help patent "stuff" as a defensive measure. I don't see anything wrong with accepting we live in an imperfect world where somebody very evil might threaten us and try to shut us down for evil reasons. So you build big tall walls and stock supplies and gunpowder hoping to never use them.
Patent TROLLS are the aggressors, do you blame these companies for planning ahead and preparing to defend themselves from bullies?
Here is a slightly longer list of companies that have sold us (Backblaze) hard drive recently:
B&H Video
CTI-Computech International
Central Computers
Kingstar
NVS Systems
Upgrade Express (might have changed their name?)
We have "farmed" from Costo, Best Buy, and Amazon within the last 6 months. This is where individuals buy "sales item" hard drives. So if you watch for sales, you are are probably getting as good as a price as Backblaze gets.