And ActiveX got a severe makeover in IE7. So much so that practically everything broke. Which is why IE6 hung around so long.
Of course, you have admit that South Korea is FINALLY getting around to fixing it given IE7+ has been around for years now. I'm guessing Windows 7 and XP Mode support is getting harder to come by?
I tried for a day to get Linux installed on my Mac. I thought Boot Camp would be perfect; it repartitioned the drive nicely, but I couldn't get Linux to load. I couldn't delete the Windows partition, couldn't remake it as a Linux partition. Eventually gave up. Is there a way to do this?
It's a lot easier now than it was in the past, but all you need to do avoid legacy boot.
And that's what happened here - Apple stopped supporting legacy boot.
Instead, it's UEFI firmware does a UEFI boot, which has been supported in Linux for ages (at least to Ubuntu 8.04 or earlier).
And you need to think EFI boot.
Once you do that, it's easy. In fact, there are so many tutorials on installing Linux on Macs that I think you didn't google at all.
Anyhow, first thing first, you need to overwrite the Mac EFI boot manager - the one that gives you that nice startup disc selection. It's just an EFI application. Use something like rEFIt and you're done. It's just a more sophisticated boot manager.
From there, use rEFIt to boot your EFI-based OS. Like Linux (you know how on the CD it has that "BOOT/EFI" directory? Bingo).
In fact, Windows 7 can EFI boot - it has EFI support right there. Many laptops that come with Windows 7 use EFI mode rather than legacy boot, which is a huge PITA if you try to reinstall.
Of course, it's only a matter of time before someone re-writes the compatibility module so you can boot the EFI application to do a legacy boot.
What is the purpose of security alerts if not to warn people who don't know any better? For the crowd that gets it, you could flash a brief icon featuring a guy fawkes mask and that'd be sufficient. I also wonder how many of them would click "proceed anyway" if the pr0ns were there...
The purpose is because the developer doesn't know how to do it properly.
The problem is developers don't want to acknowledge the security problem and are just passing it off - it's called Dancing Pigs (or rabbits, whatever) and the basic concept is given a choice, a user will choose one that compromises security every time. If you ask them to click through a warning dialog to get to the pr0n, guess what? They will!
Plus, there's also an over saturation of warnings. They're like EULAs - the vast majority of people just do not read them.They become just another obstacle in the way to accomplishing what they want.
The reality is, Dancing Pigs is real, and it's really a tough choice in handling it. Walled gardens is one way, and it can be quite successful, but there's always the edge cases and the "but I wanna do this!" crowd - you can choose to ignore them, or handle them. But even handling them may not be a good choice - see Android's "Allow Non-Play Store Apps" checkbox that's all or nothing. With it checked, you can sideload, but what if you just want to use apps from another store, like say, Amazon? You can't just allow Amazon and block everyone else.
It's even harder if you want to cater to the average user (who really wants to just get their work done) and those of developers (who want to play with the computer) - you can lock it down, let users get their work done, but the developers will complain of inflexibility. Or you can make it cater to developers, but then users will complain of complexity and "why do I have to learn all this just to do X? Why are you wasting my time making me learn all this extra crap just so I can produce this one report?"
(Or, for a more cynical take - thank you Mr. Developer, because making me take an extra hour to learn it means I can bill you an extra hour! Yeah, not what you want to see from your lawyer, accountant, mechanic or other person - having that hour billed to YOU...)
Think of the "decency" statues for broadcast TV. Sometimes you can swear (playing Saving Private Ryan) sometimes you can't (some random award show) Sometimes you can show nudity (NYPD Blue) sometimes you can't (Superbowl?) The FCC will let you know you violated the unspecified rules via a fine well after the fact.
The reason for this is simple - the FCC for this operates on a complaint basis. Now some rather conservative parents got their panties in a knot over "wardrobe malfunction" (no doubt helped by massive publicity about it) who see a boob and panic that their children will now turn into masturbating sex-crazed addicts from that brief exposure to nudity.
These days though, those groups are now concentrating on apps - it's why forced Apple to clear the App Store of porn apps (because the same group decided to methodically go and complain about each and every porn app).
Nonsense, I totally think kids should be in new cars...
New cars tend to have the best safety equipment, or at least better than what was standard 5-10 years ago.
I think so too. However, I think the parents should pick the car - pick a boring car that's known for extreme reliability, and low cost.
Something like the utterly dull Toyota Corolla - just a boring vehicle but with good reliability.
A new car gives them the newest safety equipment, but also is generally more reliable. Last thing a parent wants is to worry about their kid stuck in a broken down vehicle. Just something that will reliably get them from point A to point B for a few years then they can upgrade to another car.
TL/DR: Javascript+HTML5 is the new Java applet + Flash Player + ActiveX control.
But it's far better than before. Because Flash Player and ActiveX you were limited to waiting for a third party to fix the flaw. There's nothing the browser vendor or the user could do. JavaScript/HTML5? The browser vendor's at fault and hell, it may even be possible to fix it yourself.
JavaScript/HTML5 may be the new vulnerability, but it's a lot easier to fix the issue. If the vulnerability was in Flash Player or some random ActiveX object, you're stuck waiting for Adobe or other third party to make the fix. With JavaScript/HTML5, the browser vendor can fix it, if it's open source, you or the community can fix it.
So yeah, there's vulnerabilities, but the resolution of which is far easier. It may even be simply switching browsers!
Especially if the any of this ill gotten intelligence serves to save you or your loved ones from dying horribly right?
Get impaired off the road first and maybe you'll have a point. And by impaired, I mean by distraction (e.g., phones), drugs, or alcohol.
It's sort of funny how "terrorism" doesn't actually kill a lot of people - overall, traffic accidents cause far more fatalities and the ones dying are rarely the ones who made the poor decision.
So yes, getting hit by an impaired driver is often a terrible way to go because there's little you could've done to prevent it.
Me too, since the only reason they want you to use their router is in the first place is to price gouge with rental fees.
Not the only reason. Some are now using these routers to set up a hotspot from your home. Peeps connectin' for free - what could go wrong?
Now of course, that's silly economics. If people can legally mooch off their neighbors, why would they pay for their own connection? so everyone decides to drop their service at the same time, including the person who was the last unwitting provider in the hood.
To use those hotspots require you to be a subscriber of said service. So if you're a Comcast subscriber, you can use those Comcast hotposts that Comcast makes available.
If your neighbors want to use your hotspot, they're still paying for internet service. Just a crappier version of it because the hotspot one is usually rate limited. They could just instead use the one they're paying for.
It's not "free wifi" - it's a gated access wifi - as long as you're a subscriber to internet service from that company, you can use that hotspot.
Mooching off your neighbours means yours sits idle. Comcast or whoever still gets their pound of flesh from you every month. (And your neighbor is free to mooch off your modem since they subscribe to the same service).
And yes, it's an annoyance if you're in a marginal area with overlap and your wifi switches from your home router to your neighbor's.
OK, IANAL, so help me out here. If that's the case, why do plaintiffs get anything at all? Why not just give all the compensation to the lawyers and let those naive plaintiffs go make themselves whole? Why in the heck should the legal system care about people who were damaged in the first place?
Well, it's because the purpose of the courts is to try to make yourself whole. Except in the case of a class action, where it's practically impossible.
You see, a class action lawsuit is designed for instances where the defendant causes damage as a whole, but individually, not so much. Let's say your cellphone carrier overbills you $1 a month. On contract. Over two years, that's an extra $24. Will you go take them to court over it? Even small claims will have a larger filing fee.
Now, let's say the same cell carrier has only 10M customers. Doing this "overbilling" nets them an extra $10M a month, or $120M a year. Really, a decent chunk of money.
Now, some customers will complain, but if you do it every month, you'll wear them down (you can put them on hold for 30 minutes and most people will forget about the $1).
individually, no customer is hurt big, but as a whole, damage was caused. And hell, because it's so profitable, others want in as well - imagine your insurance provider doing the same, your TV provider, your internet provider, etc. etc. etc. All skimming an extra few bucks a month.
And you can get away with a lot before people start to find it's worth it to file a lawsuit.
Now, what kind of compensation do you want? I mean everyone was hurt only a little bit, so the actual "make whole" part is pretty small.
And you're perfectly free to opt out of the class action and bring forth your own suit to be made whole again. Just it's likely to cost you more time and money than it's worth.
What you propose already happens today - you're free to opt out (and you have until they start distributing the awards to do so, so if you think what they give Is lame, you're free to pursue your own lawsuit).
They are on rural land, clearly not within the airspace of an actual tower,
Non-sequitor. You can be in controlled airspace over rural property. In fact, the airport where I did my training was like that. There was a suburb to the west of it, but to the east was all farmland, highways and a bog, all in controlled airspae Granted, it was uncontrolled below 1500', but that was because there were two airparks nearby there as well.
What's the point of requiring a license and medical?
Here's where/. ignorance shows. (For a group of people who desire everyone not be ignorant of something (i.e., computers), they are plenty ignorant of other things, it seems)
A pilot's license doesn't actually expire. Once you have it, you have it. Neither does the radio license. They're both yours until you die. There's nothing you can really do to get rid of that.
Ah, but you say, surely the FAA can revoke it, right? Sort of. You see, just having a pilot's license and a radio license doesn't make you legal to fly anywhere. You have to have a medical - the trifecta of pilot's license, radio license and medical makes you legal to fly anywhere in the world. The medical expires, needs to be renewed, and is a required document if you want to fly. So what the FAA and other regulatory bodies do is they simply cancel the medical (which is tied to your license), thereby grounding you. You may wonder about Sport Pilot licenses - those aren't internationally recognized at all and the FAA probably wants the easier option of cancelling a medical.
So the medical serves as a way to enforce legal action should the conditions of the drone's operation be violated. The FAA is basically requiring there be a person of authority on the record for the flight who will conduct it in a safe manner. And presumably, would ensure that the flight has overrides in case things go awry - it is possible to exceed 400' should a wind pick up and the drone gets sudden lift.
And no, 400' may be uncontrolled, but it's not anything goes - the FAA has enforced legal action against those operating aircraft (drones) in a clearly unsafe manner despite within rules for RC flight per advisory circular. In this case someone was basically using their drone to buzz people in a park - diving at bystanders, flying erratically through a narrow tunnel filled with pedestrians, etc. (the video the idiot took clearly showed pedestrians scrambling away from the drone) The FAA sought action, was rebuffed initially by the NTSB, appealed, and got a ruling that said the FAA is well within their enforcement powers to pursue those operating aircraft in an unsafe manner. There's plenty of aerial activity below 400' - crop dusting, regular flights and such.
Wouldn't it just be easier to have a dip switch and require cracking the case open to flash the bios? At least then, a switch can detect the case opening and send a signal to something or tick a counter that can be checked every once in a while easily.
Two problems.
First, BIOS updates are made much more difficult with a switch - expecting a user to dig around to update is a support nightmare.
Also, that works great on desktops, but laptops are a significant seller (remember laptops started outselling desktop PCs 10 years ago), so having users poke around and unscrew flaps while the computer is on so they can hit buttons to flash gets tricky, quick.
Then there's the need to be able to detect the position of the switch in software so you can generate a nice error message - nothing is more scary than "FLASHING FAILED!" and the user being stuck with an unbootable system because they forgot to push a button or other thing.
And then there's those Steve Jobs emails that revealed major players in Silicon Valley created their own de facto non-compete policies with each other. The study is incomplete without examining intra-California career stifling.
That only affected "pull" style recruitments - where a company recruits from another company.
You as an employee were completely free to apply for a position at the other company. If you worked at Apple and wanted to go to Google, you submitted your resume to Google. If Google liked you, you interviewed and got hired.
What Google couldn't do is go to an Apple employee and make them an immediate offer.
And there are PLENTY of ways around this - including the use of mutual friends to say "Please apply for this job" - the only thing Google would want is to make sure it is YOU that made the first move.
Which is why the scope of it is extremely limited - if people want you, you know it and are free to apply. And if you networked properly, you would hear about the opportunity through your grapevine with no official documentation saying it really was Google poaching you in the end. All it takes is a few phone calls and you're in.
How do I know? I was part of this - I knew a company wanted me, and someone I knew at that company basically said "Phone (xxx) 555-5555". Made the call and they said they were posting a job that I should apply for (basically it was tailored for me). It was a public posting, so anyone could apply, but really it was my job to lose. And the only official documentation that existed would be my accessing the public jobs site.
All perfectly legit. Sort of a loophole, but none of the agreements said you couldn't work there, just they won't pull you.
And really, in the end, if you're being pulled, it's because you know someone there. Google will not call up random Apple employees offering them a job - they'd consult with employees who worked at Apple to pick specific employees.
Even at a job fair - if Apple employees walked past the Google booth, as long as it was on the up and up (Apple employees dropped off their resumes along with everyone else), it was fine.
If you were wanted, you knew. If you weren't, you made sure to keep in touch to build a grapevine.
Microsoft has done this king of thing before. They used to offer Office at over 90% discount to students. No point trying to charge them money they don't have, they will just pirate. Microsoft found a way to turn them into paying customers, which is better than nothing.
More than 90%. I think my dad got a copy of Office 2010 for $10 when his company did a massive infrastructure upgrade and upgraded their entire system.
The goal is strictly marketing - if you convince people to use Windows, they'll probably stick with Windows. You may not get much money out of them, but there are long term issues to worry about - namely, platform support. If you want developers to write for your platform, you need to convince them that your platform is worth writing for. If a Chinese user is forced to choose between Windows and Linux, and they start going Linux, it hurts Windows because developers might start writing for Linux instead.
Microsoft had to lose the mobile battle to figure that part out - that it's no longer "if you build it, they will come." You have to convince them to come.
Windows is under constant threat - even Microsoft itself is hurting it through competition (i.e., Xbox) removing a reason to use Windows.
If they can convince people to stick with Windows, they're more likely to stick with Windows and Office in the long run.
Ask Microsoft how much HP pays them for the Windows license on the Stream 7 tablet ($100 tablet)? It's basically zip. Nada. Microsoft is basically giving away Windows licenses to super-cheap tablets to compete with Android. (Not that I mind, I have an iPad, but picked up a Stream 7, basically because it's a full PC for $100. It's no screamer, but for $100, it's pretty neat that you have access to everything on the desktop, including Steam, a bunch of ancient Windows 3.1 apps I use, etc.)
If valve can somehow get into console land with steam machines you can expect PC gaming to ultimately take over, not that I'm saying it will but if he finds some way to crack the console market it's a possibility.
All the consoles are basically rebadged PC's with some customization, that's all they are at this point.
No, Steam machines have a fundamental problem - they suck.
First off, the problem with PC gaming is piracy. Face it - 90% piracy has lead to developers targeting consoles. And it's still that high despite Steam (no-Steam hacks are plentiful, and it's why Steam has support for 3rd-party DRM still).
So the PC will remain the realm of secondary for AAA devs and the playground of indie. AAA devs will do console first, make back the big bucks, then do a half-assed port to PC as always. It might be a bit easier to take your Xbone game and run it on Windows 10, but you still have a port. Basically the devs will make their big bucks on the console, then when it tapers off, they'll release the PC version and hope to sell enough to pay for the port. Any extra is icing.
This is only broken by games that DO sell well on the PC where effective DRM is possible - i.e., games where online is a major component. So your Call of Duty or Battlefield will have day 1 ports because there is a sizable PC contingent who will buy it on day one at full price, to whom serial numbers are easily verified by servers, etc. Plus, PC users help bring it to the point of "1 billion copies sold on day one!" type PR announcements. (There are also many valid reasons for releasing on PC, since keyboard+mouse rules FPS world).
But for other games,... not so much. Couple that with the perchant for steam sales and well, you're hoping to make it up in volume. Hell, I won't buy a PC game unless it hits $5 on sale, except in VERY rare circumstances. It's a race to the bottom, and if you want your PC game to be $70, it's got to have a big customer base who will pay full price. If not, they're going to wait for a steam sale, so better to sell on consoles for $60-70 first, release on PC 3 months later at $40, then a month later discount it to $20 for steam sale and let that be the PC release. Then 6 months later discount it to $5 and pick up the remainder as profit, hopefully.
Steam Machines? No, they're not taking over, unless you can guarantee me a $500 machine will last 10 years with zero upgrades. And seeing the initial batch, the $500 machines are... underwhelming. The good machines are $1200+, and even then you can get a console, get the "plus" (PS+, XBL Gold) services for $50 a year for 10 years, and still be ahead of a Steam Machine.
Or you can pop in a new $200 video card every couple of years and consoles will come out ahead.
Or we're gonna have to put up with an i3 with midrange discrete GPUs for the next 10 years as the "it must run on this configuration" system. Just like how we complained the PS3 and Xbox360 were holding back gaming... 4 years ago.
They won't do so because of the CC fees that are involved on a per transaction basis.
Debit also incurs interchange fees. Typically 25 cents plus 25 cents plus 1% (the merchant pays 25 cents, the user pays 25 cents, and the merchant then pays another 1% of the transaction as fees).
The only reason I knew about the debit fees to customers was a retailer who was super honest kept refunding people who used debit a quarter. he said his bank charges him 25 cents, the user gets another 25 cents tacked on to the amount and there's also a tiny percentage taken as well. Not as much as credit, but still. He decided long ago he'd eat all the fees so he paid everyone who paid in debit a quarter out of the till.
Isn't this how the XBox became the XBox? They released the code name of their internal project, people kept using the name, and then they just stuck with it?
On the one hand "Microsoft Spartan" doesn't seem corporate enough. On the other hand it'll fit right in with Firefox & Chrome, which also have non-descriptive names that are pan-inoffensive yet interesting...
Well, the Xbox was really internally called the DirectX Box...
Though, you'd have to wonder if maybe Nadella is secretly a Halo fan or something. I mean, it was odd enough to have Cortana. Sure video gamers know who she is, and it kinda-sorta makes sense, but you'd think some sort of corporate self-censorship would've made it a nice bland name.
Then there's Spartan... of the many different names you could use to call a web browser, even one using the same Trident engine IE used...
(Project SPARTAN is/was the secret project behind supersoldiers like Master Chief).
I'm wonder what next - what thing might Microsoft call say, the Warthog next?
The illusion of security is more likely to cause people to divulge information that they wouldn't do in plain text.
I remember when the export key laws were in place. Once the regulations were changed doing away with them, software and equipment should have been required to remove the obsolete code or be taken off the market.
My question is how could OpenSSL still have had this potential backdoor? Why was this not removed at first opportunity?
Yes, bad encryption is worse than none.
It's why Facebook has "privacy controls" - it's purely a marketing thing. By making people think their information is safe, they're going to divulge more of it.
As for why OpenSSL did it - most likely it's not OpenSSL's fault. I'd almost guarantee what happened is because the first-time startup took so long, some guy said "make it faster" (it can take a couple of minutes to generate the keys the first time on a slower embedded platform). So to "make it happen" they simply pre-generated the keys and embedded it in the firmware.
binaural = stereo 3d audio = surround sound (5.1/7.1/8.1/etc)
both have been around forever.
As have speaker virtualization.
This is basically another form of speaker virtualization - the ability to simulate a surround sound system using headphones. They do work (since you only have two ears, they just have to reproduce how your ear hears each speaker), and they do keep you from having the "inside your head" feeling you get with stereo sound played on normal headphones.
However, it's a bit more flexible in that you don't just have a virtual surround setup playing discrete channels of audio. Instead, it lets you position sounds, then simulates how it would sound if it was actually happening and plays that modified audio to your headphones, so it appears that the object was at the location.
Most virtualization systems (Dolby Headphone, DTS Headphone, Virtuaphone (Sony proprietary) and others) use HRTF (head-related transfer function) methods to compute how audio that's heard at some location in space will be heard by someone so it can be downmixed into two channel audio.
This is but yet another one. And I'm sure not the last - a few game engines also have the ability to compute 3D audio.
The other way of doing it is fine if the objects are located in discrete locations - there are a few virtualization systems that use convolution filters by having impulse responses measured from sources at discrete locations and how they're received by microphones.
How do you obtain the expected signatures to match against the package if not by HTTPS or similar?
As you point out, if Verisign is happy to oblige, then the signatures can be altered in-transit as easily as the packages here, and there'd be no warning.
It only takes one Apple-signed developer package in the hands of someone with this kind of access to fake the origin and authenticity of the package signature AND package if the connection itself isn't secure.
The packages are signed by Apple using a key provided by Apple. That's what Apple's trusted developer program is about.
As for your solution of provided an alternate signed binary? That was always true even in the normal case. OS X accepts two kinds of apps by default - Mac App Store apps and apps signed by a developer using a certificate provided by Apple. The latter is for those programs that aren't in the MAS for one reason or another (perhaps they were rejected, or the developer doesn't want to go through the process - whatever).
But that "vulnerability" of being able to use it to sign malware has been there from day 1 since Apple doesn't control what developers use their certificate for. In fact, there has been at least one malware attack that used a legitimate developer certificate - Apple revoked it the next day which meant the malware couldn't run anymore. (No word if the developer got a warning about it - since you paid $99 for the certificate, Apple has payment information that tracks every developer who signed anything).
A more Linux example would be someone who replaced a package in a repo with a modified one and got it all re-signed. There's no real way around it - the files are legitimately signed so as far as the computer is concerned, it's all kosher.
It isn't a TOC-TOU (time of check - time of use) problem, it's basically replacing one signed binary with another. About the only thing an installer could do is check that the files it installs are signed with the same certificate - otherwise well, if you wanted to, you could pay Apple $99 and sign your malware with it.
ApplePay is part of the problem. Because it tries so hard to keep information away from banks and retailers it makes it harder to detect fraud. If Apple were providing things like names and phone numbers to the banks they could very easily see that a particular CC was not being used by the authorized owner or on a phone they had never used it with before.
To be fair, banks could have demanded that information during sign up, but didn't. There is plenty of blame to go around. What I'd like to know is who pays for it. Usually it is the merchant, in which case I'd expect to see some of them refusing Apple Pay.
Actually Apple DOES provide some information to the banks. They provide information they know about the user - limited iTunes account information and how long that account has existed IS passed to the bank. (Presumably, if the card is being associated with a new iTunes account, the bank should be more careful). Stuff like names aren't important (because when you buy a credit card number you get a name, so it's trivial to make a new iTunes account with that name). Presumably, the method the number was entered is also passed on (you can take a photo of your credit card to add it - assuming that's probably a bit more secure than if you merely typed it in... don't know if the photo itself is sent to the bank).
And yes, banks respond back to Apple with whether it's completely accepted (green path), rejected, or further verification required.
As for who is liable, that's an interesting question because in the end, the merchant doesn't really know how the transaction was done - it appears to them as a regular credit card transaction. Only the bank knows when they look up the token that the transaction was actually done by Apple Pay.
the EPA can worry about the environment, leave NASA to what NASA is supposed to do. National Aeronautics and Space Administration. Not the climatechange administration. not the muslim outreach administration but the National Aeronautics and Space Administration.
Please give NASA more money, but make sure it is used for space exploration as intended. I dont see why this is getting so much heat
Sorry, but space is NOT NASA's only mandate.
NASA's mandate is right there in the name: National AERONAUTICS and Space Administration. In fact, NASA's "space" mandate only came around in the 60s. Prior to that they were known as NACA, the National Advisory Council on Aeronautics.
NASA's primary goal is actually about aviation. Space was merely tacked on because as a primarily science-based organization, they had the ability to extend their research beyond the atmosphere.
If you think climate change has nothing to do with aviation, you're wrong. Weather is an extremely important factor in aviation, and long term changes in weather (aka, climate) will have effects to the safety and conduct of flights. Maybe not now, but in the longer term future. It's why NASA does extensive climate studies - it's actually vital. We learned more in the past 50 years of aviation accidents about how weather and changes thereof affect flights - from volcanoes, windshear, microbursts, icing, to many other reasons why planes went down.
The NTSB investigates accidents and provides recommendations. The FAA implements those recommendations, however, in order to do so it might need to rely on NASA for the technology and know-how in order to make informed decisions about equipment and procedures.
NOAA? They're part of the Department of Commerce and they're concerned about how climate can affect the economy. It's a different branch of study. NASA's concerned about how climate can affect the atmosphere (which affects how planes fly through the air). While the missions often overlap, there are things NOAA does that doesn't concern NASA (e.g., NOAA monitors icebergs with Canada - this was established a year after the Titanic sank. But iceberg monitoring isn't important to NASA (since that primarily affects ships at sea). However, how the Arctic and Antarctic ice sheets behave IS since that does have climate implications that could impact flight).
I've yet to see / notice product placement in the stuff my daughters watch (mainly animated stuff). But there is a HELL of a lot of merchandising for the shows.
Yeah, it's called the show itself.
This started around 1984, actually - the FCC lessened the rules regarding targeting children. It's what lead to the show-length ads we called cartoons. You know, TV shows like Transformers, GI Joe, My Little Pony, Jem and others. They were basically 30 minute ads in the form of shows. They weren't completely in your face about it like an infomercial, but they were still ads.
And yes, the merchandising IS the reason those shows were produced.
Hell, Hasbro figured it out way back in 1986 when they created the original animated Transformers movie. Its sole goal is to basically get rid of all the existing toys to make room for a new lineup. Kids actually cried out - some from the fact that their entire collection was now "gone", others from the death of Optimus Prime who was so beloved that midway through season 3, Hasbro brought him back.
But yeah, if you grew up in the 80s, most of your cartoon TV programming were actually ads. If you watch the episodes today (thanks to DVD box sets) you actually notice how blatant it is at times.
Oh yeah, this extends to today as well - Transformers, GI Joe, Battleship - those movies Hasbro basically licensed it out for free to Hollywood - the prime consideration is not how well the movies did at the box office (that was Hollywood's problem), but how well Hasbro's sales did.
In the city, there's a (slow) "charging station" located within 10 metres of the road. It's called an "electrical socket" and while 110V 15A is slow charge, the "infrastructure" is plentiful and extremely common.
Of course, public use plugs are extremely rare, but given how many people gather around plugs to charge their smartphones...
Although I question how much of a benefit this will really be. As it is, even without heatpipes, smartphone thermal throttles are usually set WELL below the CPU's junction temperature limit - the reason is that it's to prevent other components from getting too hot (like the battery). I remember talking to some Sony engineers, and IIRC, the CPU thermal throttle in most Xperia Z family units is not set to protect any of the internal components, but to protect the user's hand. Fujitsu's tricks might actually reduce the junction temperature at which a CPU can operate without burning the user.
Actually, thermal control is a compromise. ARMs have traditionally consumed 1mW/MHz, which is great back when everything was 500MHz or less. These days you have "octacore" processors running at 2.5GHz, you're looking at 10-20W in a tiny package with poor cooling (because Package on Package to put RAM on top of the SoC). Add in everything else and going full tilt you could easily have to deal with 15+W.
Given the thermal resistance of the package, you can easily reach junction temperature (125C) stupidly quickly.
One analysis of a chip I saw had 2 cores going 100%, while cores 3 and 4 had to be thermally limited to 50% to keep the junction temperature down. And it needed to start well before the temperature was reached - or you'll overshoot the temperature.
Then there's the system configuration - is the CPU beside the battery? Then you'd want to keep it from getting too hot (you can still get max junction temperature and be only at 45C at the top because of thermal resistance) . Or use the metal in the screen as a heatsink.
A large amount of heat in a SoC is also conducted away through the balls - ground and power planes that double as heatsinks aren't uncommon.
You'd think. But you'd be wrong. Digg did it. Firefox did it. GNOME did it. Even Slashdot damn near did it. UI is about elegant discoverable interfaces between user and computer, and if this means expensive testing and actually listening to feedback that says "don't fix what isn't broken," so be it. UX, by contrast, relies on bogus metrics to justify change for its own sake - said change always requiring the hiring of more UX people, for some strange reason.
UX has become a cancer upon the profession. UXtards destroy products in order to leave their creative stamp on them. They lie to the marketroids and the C-suite by convincing them that change for its own sake is value-add. The existence of UX personnel in your organization ultimately results in a loss of marketshare and mindshare. Fire them all before your customers do.
And don't forget the compliant press who believes shiny should be different.
Because you know what the biggest complaint about iOS6 was? That the UI, which has changed little since iPhone OS 1.0, was "dated" and "outmoded".
UIs SHOULD be incredibly stable - they SHOULD get out of the way. The only way a UI is dated or outmoded is if it gets in the way of the user. (E.g., how iOS used to do notifications).
It's not just UX designers deciding to revamp everything - it's the press that decides that just because your windows look the same for 2 years that it needs redesign.
It's really why Apple bothered to go flat in iOS7, to partially implement it in Mavericks, etc. The press was basically calling out Apple for being stubborn with "stale" UIs.
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And ActiveX got a severe makeover in IE7. So much so that practically everything broke. Which is why IE6 hung around so long.
Of course, you have admit that South Korea is FINALLY getting around to fixing it given IE7+ has been around for years now. I'm guessing Windows 7 and XP Mode support is getting harder to come by?
It's a lot easier now than it was in the past, but all you need to do avoid legacy boot.
And that's what happened here - Apple stopped supporting legacy boot.
Instead, it's UEFI firmware does a UEFI boot, which has been supported in Linux for ages (at least to Ubuntu 8.04 or earlier).
And you need to think EFI boot.
Once you do that, it's easy. In fact, there are so many tutorials on installing Linux on Macs that I think you didn't google at all.
Anyhow, first thing first, you need to overwrite the Mac EFI boot manager - the one that gives you that nice startup disc selection. It's just an EFI application. Use something like rEFIt and you're done. It's just a more sophisticated boot manager.
From there, use rEFIt to boot your EFI-based OS. Like Linux (you know how on the CD it has that "BOOT/EFI" directory? Bingo).
In fact, Windows 7 can EFI boot - it has EFI support right there. Many laptops that come with Windows 7 use EFI mode rather than legacy boot, which is a huge PITA if you try to reinstall.
Of course, it's only a matter of time before someone re-writes the compatibility module so you can boot the EFI application to do a legacy boot.
The purpose is because the developer doesn't know how to do it properly.
The problem is developers don't want to acknowledge the security problem and are just passing it off - it's called Dancing Pigs (or rabbits, whatever) and the basic concept is given a choice, a user will choose one that compromises security every time. If you ask them to click through a warning dialog to get to the pr0n, guess what? They will!
Plus, there's also an over saturation of warnings. They're like EULAs - the vast majority of people just do not read them.They become just another obstacle in the way to accomplishing what they want.
The reality is, Dancing Pigs is real, and it's really a tough choice in handling it. Walled gardens is one way, and it can be quite successful, but there's always the edge cases and the "but I wanna do this!" crowd - you can choose to ignore them, or handle them. But even handling them may not be a good choice - see Android's "Allow Non-Play Store Apps" checkbox that's all or nothing. With it checked, you can sideload, but what if you just want to use apps from another store, like say, Amazon? You can't just allow Amazon and block everyone else.
It's even harder if you want to cater to the average user (who really wants to just get their work done) and those of developers (who want to play with the computer) - you can lock it down, let users get their work done, but the developers will complain of inflexibility. Or you can make it cater to developers, but then users will complain of complexity and "why do I have to learn all this just to do X? Why are you wasting my time making me learn all this extra crap just so I can produce this one report?"
(Or, for a more cynical take - thank you Mr. Developer, because making me take an extra hour to learn it means I can bill you an extra hour! Yeah, not what you want to see from your lawyer, accountant, mechanic or other person - having that hour billed to YOU...)
The reason for this is simple - the FCC for this operates on a complaint basis. Now some rather conservative parents got their panties in a knot over "wardrobe malfunction" (no doubt helped by massive publicity about it) who see a boob and panic that their children will now turn into masturbating sex-crazed addicts from that brief exposure to nudity.
These days though, those groups are now concentrating on apps - it's why forced Apple to clear the App Store of porn apps (because the same group decided to methodically go and complain about each and every porn app).
I think so too. However, I think the parents should pick the car - pick a boring car that's known for extreme reliability, and low cost.
Something like the utterly dull Toyota Corolla - just a boring vehicle but with good reliability.
A new car gives them the newest safety equipment, but also is generally more reliable. Last thing a parent wants is to worry about their kid stuck in a broken down vehicle. Just something that will reliably get them from point A to point B for a few years then they can upgrade to another car.
But it's far better than before. Because Flash Player and ActiveX you were limited to waiting for a third party to fix the flaw. There's nothing the browser vendor or the user could do. JavaScript/HTML5? The browser vendor's at fault and hell, it may even be possible to fix it yourself.
JavaScript/HTML5 may be the new vulnerability, but it's a lot easier to fix the issue. If the vulnerability was in Flash Player or some random ActiveX object, you're stuck waiting for Adobe or other third party to make the fix. With JavaScript/HTML5, the browser vendor can fix it, if it's open source, you or the community can fix it.
So yeah, there's vulnerabilities, but the resolution of which is far easier. It may even be simply switching browsers!
Get impaired off the road first and maybe you'll have a point. And by impaired, I mean by distraction (e.g., phones), drugs, or alcohol.
It's sort of funny how "terrorism" doesn't actually kill a lot of people - overall, traffic accidents cause far more fatalities and the ones dying are rarely the ones who made the poor decision.
So yes, getting hit by an impaired driver is often a terrible way to go because there's little you could've done to prevent it.
To use those hotspots require you to be a subscriber of said service. So if you're a Comcast subscriber, you can use those Comcast hotposts that Comcast makes available.
If your neighbors want to use your hotspot, they're still paying for internet service. Just a crappier version of it because the hotspot one is usually rate limited. They could just instead use the one they're paying for.
It's not "free wifi" - it's a gated access wifi - as long as you're a subscriber to internet service from that company, you can use that hotspot.
Mooching off your neighbours means yours sits idle. Comcast or whoever still gets their pound of flesh from you every month. (And your neighbor is free to mooch off your modem since they subscribe to the same service).
And yes, it's an annoyance if you're in a marginal area with overlap and your wifi switches from your home router to your neighbor's.
Well, it's because the purpose of the courts is to try to make yourself whole. Except in the case of a class action, where it's practically impossible.
You see, a class action lawsuit is designed for instances where the defendant causes damage as a whole, but individually, not so much. Let's say your cellphone carrier overbills you $1 a month. On contract. Over two years, that's an extra $24. Will you go take them to court over it? Even small claims will have a larger filing fee.
Now, let's say the same cell carrier has only 10M customers. Doing this "overbilling" nets them an extra $10M a month, or $120M a year. Really, a decent chunk of money.
Now, some customers will complain, but if you do it every month, you'll wear them down (you can put them on hold for 30 minutes and most people will forget about the $1).
individually, no customer is hurt big, but as a whole, damage was caused. And hell, because it's so profitable, others want in as well - imagine your insurance provider doing the same, your TV provider, your internet provider, etc. etc. etc. All skimming an extra few bucks a month.
And you can get away with a lot before people start to find it's worth it to file a lawsuit.
Now, what kind of compensation do you want? I mean everyone was hurt only a little bit, so the actual "make whole" part is pretty small.
And you're perfectly free to opt out of the class action and bring forth your own suit to be made whole again. Just it's likely to cost you more time and money than it's worth.
What you propose already happens today - you're free to opt out (and you have until they start distributing the awards to do so, so if you think what they give Is lame, you're free to pursue your own lawsuit).
Non-sequitor. You can be in controlled airspace over rural property. In fact, the airport where I did my training was like that. There was a suburb to the west of it, but to the east was all farmland, highways and a bog, all in controlled airspae Granted, it was uncontrolled below 1500', but that was because there were two airparks nearby there as well.
Here's where /. ignorance shows. (For a group of people who desire everyone not be ignorant of something (i.e., computers), they are plenty ignorant of other things, it seems)
A pilot's license doesn't actually expire. Once you have it, you have it. Neither does the radio license. They're both yours until you die. There's nothing you can really do to get rid of that.
Ah, but you say, surely the FAA can revoke it, right? Sort of. You see, just having a pilot's license and a radio license doesn't make you legal to fly anywhere. You have to have a medical - the trifecta of pilot's license, radio license and medical makes you legal to fly anywhere in the world. The medical expires, needs to be renewed, and is a required document if you want to fly. So what the FAA and other regulatory bodies do is they simply cancel the medical (which is tied to your license), thereby grounding you. You may wonder about Sport Pilot licenses - those aren't internationally recognized at all and the FAA probably wants the easier option of cancelling a medical.
So the medical serves as a way to enforce legal action should the conditions of the drone's operation be violated. The FAA is basically requiring there be a person of authority on the record for the flight who will conduct it in a safe manner. And presumably, would ensure that the flight has overrides in case things go awry - it is possible to exceed 400' should a wind pick up and the drone gets sudden lift.
And no, 400' may be uncontrolled, but it's not anything goes - the FAA has enforced legal action against those operating aircraft (drones) in a clearly unsafe manner despite within rules for RC flight per advisory circular. In this case someone was basically using their drone to buzz people in a park - diving at bystanders, flying erratically through a narrow tunnel filled with pedestrians, etc. (the video the idiot took clearly showed pedestrians scrambling away from the drone) The FAA sought action, was rebuffed initially by the NTSB, appealed, and got a ruling that said the FAA is well within their enforcement powers to pursue those operating aircraft in an unsafe manner. There's plenty of aerial activity below 400' - crop dusting, regular flights and such.
Two problems.
First, BIOS updates are made much more difficult with a switch - expecting a user to dig around to update is a support nightmare.
Also, that works great on desktops, but laptops are a significant seller (remember laptops started outselling desktop PCs 10 years ago), so having users poke around and unscrew flaps while the computer is on so they can hit buttons to flash gets tricky, quick.
Then there's the need to be able to detect the position of the switch in software so you can generate a nice error message - nothing is more scary than "FLASHING FAILED!" and the user being stuck with an unbootable system because they forgot to push a button or other thing.
That only affected "pull" style recruitments - where a company recruits from another company.
You as an employee were completely free to apply for a position at the other company. If you worked at Apple and wanted to go to Google, you submitted your resume to Google. If Google liked you, you interviewed and got hired.
What Google couldn't do is go to an Apple employee and make them an immediate offer.
And there are PLENTY of ways around this - including the use of mutual friends to say "Please apply for this job" - the only thing Google would want is to make sure it is YOU that made the first move.
Which is why the scope of it is extremely limited - if people want you, you know it and are free to apply. And if you networked properly, you would hear about the opportunity through your grapevine with no official documentation saying it really was Google poaching you in the end. All it takes is a few phone calls and you're in.
How do I know? I was part of this - I knew a company wanted me, and someone I knew at that company basically said "Phone (xxx) 555-5555". Made the call and they said they were posting a job that I should apply for (basically it was tailored for me). It was a public posting, so anyone could apply, but really it was my job to lose. And the only official documentation that existed would be my accessing the public jobs site.
All perfectly legit. Sort of a loophole, but none of the agreements said you couldn't work there, just they won't pull you.
And really, in the end, if you're being pulled, it's because you know someone there. Google will not call up random Apple employees offering them a job - they'd consult with employees who worked at Apple to pick specific employees.
Even at a job fair - if Apple employees walked past the Google booth, as long as it was on the up and up (Apple employees dropped off their resumes along with everyone else), it was fine.
If you were wanted, you knew. If you weren't, you made sure to keep in touch to build a grapevine.
More than 90%. I think my dad got a copy of Office 2010 for $10 when his company did a massive infrastructure upgrade and upgraded their entire system.
The goal is strictly marketing - if you convince people to use Windows, they'll probably stick with Windows. You may not get much money out of them, but there are long term issues to worry about - namely, platform support. If you want developers to write for your platform, you need to convince them that your platform is worth writing for. If a Chinese user is forced to choose between Windows and Linux, and they start going Linux, it hurts Windows because developers might start writing for Linux instead.
Microsoft had to lose the mobile battle to figure that part out - that it's no longer "if you build it, they will come." You have to convince them to come.
Windows is under constant threat - even Microsoft itself is hurting it through competition (i.e., Xbox) removing a reason to use Windows.
If they can convince people to stick with Windows, they're more likely to stick with Windows and Office in the long run.
Ask Microsoft how much HP pays them for the Windows license on the Stream 7 tablet ($100 tablet)? It's basically zip. Nada. Microsoft is basically giving away Windows licenses to super-cheap tablets to compete with Android. (Not that I mind, I have an iPad, but picked up a Stream 7, basically because it's a full PC for $100. It's no screamer, but for $100, it's pretty neat that you have access to everything on the desktop, including Steam, a bunch of ancient Windows 3.1 apps I use, etc.)
No, Steam machines have a fundamental problem - they suck.
First off, the problem with PC gaming is piracy. Face it - 90% piracy has lead to developers targeting consoles. And it's still that high despite Steam (no-Steam hacks are plentiful, and it's why Steam has support for 3rd-party DRM still).
So the PC will remain the realm of secondary for AAA devs and the playground of indie. AAA devs will do console first, make back the big bucks, then do a half-assed port to PC as always. It might be a bit easier to take your Xbone game and run it on Windows 10, but you still have a port. Basically the devs will make their big bucks on the console, then when it tapers off, they'll release the PC version and hope to sell enough to pay for the port. Any extra is icing.
This is only broken by games that DO sell well on the PC where effective DRM is possible - i.e., games where online is a major component. So your Call of Duty or Battlefield will have day 1 ports because there is a sizable PC contingent who will buy it on day one at full price, to whom serial numbers are easily verified by servers, etc. Plus, PC users help bring it to the point of "1 billion copies sold on day one!" type PR announcements. (There are also many valid reasons for releasing on PC, since keyboard+mouse rules FPS world).
But for other games, ... not so much. Couple that with the perchant for steam sales and well, you're hoping to make it up in volume. Hell, I won't buy a PC game unless it hits $5 on sale, except in VERY rare circumstances. It's a race to the bottom, and if you want your PC game to be $70, it's got to have a big customer base who will pay full price. If not, they're going to wait for a steam sale, so better to sell on consoles for $60-70 first, release on PC 3 months later at $40, then a month later discount it to $20 for steam sale and let that be the PC release. Then 6 months later discount it to $5 and pick up the remainder as profit, hopefully.
Steam Machines? No, they're not taking over, unless you can guarantee me a $500 machine will last 10 years with zero upgrades. And seeing the initial batch, the $500 machines are... underwhelming. The good machines are $1200+, and even then you can get a console, get the "plus" (PS+, XBL Gold) services for $50 a year for 10 years, and still be ahead of a Steam Machine.
Or you can pop in a new $200 video card every couple of years and consoles will come out ahead.
Or we're gonna have to put up with an i3 with midrange discrete GPUs for the next 10 years as the "it must run on this configuration" system. Just like how we complained the PS3 and Xbox360 were holding back gaming... 4 years ago.
Debit also incurs interchange fees. Typically 25 cents plus 25 cents plus 1% (the merchant pays 25 cents, the user pays 25 cents, and the merchant then pays another 1% of the transaction as fees).
The only reason I knew about the debit fees to customers was a retailer who was super honest kept refunding people who used debit a quarter. he said his bank charges him 25 cents, the user gets another 25 cents tacked on to the amount and there's also a tiny percentage taken as well. Not as much as credit, but still. He decided long ago he'd eat all the fees so he paid everyone who paid in debit a quarter out of the till.
Well, the Xbox was really internally called the DirectX Box...
Though, you'd have to wonder if maybe Nadella is secretly a Halo fan or something. I mean, it was odd enough to have Cortana. Sure video gamers know who she is, and it kinda-sorta makes sense, but you'd think some sort of corporate self-censorship would've made it a nice bland name.
Then there's Spartan... of the many different names you could use to call a web browser, even one using the same Trident engine IE used...
(Project SPARTAN is/was the secret project behind supersoldiers like Master Chief).
I'm wonder what next - what thing might Microsoft call say, the Warthog next?
Yes, bad encryption is worse than none.
It's why Facebook has "privacy controls" - it's purely a marketing thing. By making people think their information is safe, they're going to divulge more of it.
As for why OpenSSL did it - most likely it's not OpenSSL's fault. I'd almost guarantee what happened is because the first-time startup took so long, some guy said "make it faster" (it can take a couple of minutes to generate the keys the first time on a slower embedded platform). So to "make it happen" they simply pre-generated the keys and embedded it in the firmware.
As have speaker virtualization.
This is basically another form of speaker virtualization - the ability to simulate a surround sound system using headphones. They do work (since you only have two ears, they just have to reproduce how your ear hears each speaker), and they do keep you from having the "inside your head" feeling you get with stereo sound played on normal headphones.
However, it's a bit more flexible in that you don't just have a virtual surround setup playing discrete channels of audio. Instead, it lets you position sounds, then simulates how it would sound if it was actually happening and plays that modified audio to your headphones, so it appears that the object was at the location.
Most virtualization systems (Dolby Headphone, DTS Headphone, Virtuaphone (Sony proprietary) and others) use HRTF (head-related transfer function) methods to compute how audio that's heard at some location in space will be heard by someone so it can be downmixed into two channel audio.
This is but yet another one. And I'm sure not the last - a few game engines also have the ability to compute 3D audio.
The other way of doing it is fine if the objects are located in discrete locations - there are a few virtualization systems that use convolution filters by having impulse responses measured from sources at discrete locations and how they're received by microphones.
The packages are signed by Apple using a key provided by Apple. That's what Apple's trusted developer program is about.
As for your solution of provided an alternate signed binary? That was always true even in the normal case. OS X accepts two kinds of apps by default - Mac App Store apps and apps signed by a developer using a certificate provided by Apple. The latter is for those programs that aren't in the MAS for one reason or another (perhaps they were rejected, or the developer doesn't want to go through the process - whatever).
But that "vulnerability" of being able to use it to sign malware has been there from day 1 since Apple doesn't control what developers use their certificate for. In fact, there has been at least one malware attack that used a legitimate developer certificate - Apple revoked it the next day which meant the malware couldn't run anymore. (No word if the developer got a warning about it - since you paid $99 for the certificate, Apple has payment information that tracks every developer who signed anything).
A more Linux example would be someone who replaced a package in a repo with a modified one and got it all re-signed. There's no real way around it - the files are legitimately signed so as far as the computer is concerned, it's all kosher.
It isn't a TOC-TOU (time of check - time of use) problem, it's basically replacing one signed binary with another. About the only thing an installer could do is check that the files it installs are signed with the same certificate - otherwise well, if you wanted to, you could pay Apple $99 and sign your malware with it.
Actually Apple DOES provide some information to the banks. They provide information they know about the user - limited iTunes account information and how long that account has existed IS passed to the bank. (Presumably, if the card is being associated with a new iTunes account, the bank should be more careful). Stuff like names aren't important (because when you buy a credit card number you get a name, so it's trivial to make a new iTunes account with that name). Presumably, the method the number was entered is also passed on (you can take a photo of your credit card to add it - assuming that's probably a bit more secure than if you merely typed it in... don't know if the photo itself is sent to the bank).
And yes, banks respond back to Apple with whether it's completely accepted (green path), rejected, or further verification required.
As for who is liable, that's an interesting question because in the end, the merchant doesn't really know how the transaction was done - it appears to them as a regular credit card transaction. Only the bank knows when they look up the token that the transaction was actually done by Apple Pay.
Sorry, but space is NOT NASA's only mandate.
NASA's mandate is right there in the name: National AERONAUTICS and Space Administration. In fact, NASA's "space" mandate only came around in the 60s. Prior to that they were known as NACA, the National Advisory Council on Aeronautics.
NASA's primary goal is actually about aviation. Space was merely tacked on because as a primarily science-based organization, they had the ability to extend their research beyond the atmosphere.
If you think climate change has nothing to do with aviation, you're wrong. Weather is an extremely important factor in aviation, and long term changes in weather (aka, climate) will have effects to the safety and conduct of flights. Maybe not now, but in the longer term future. It's why NASA does extensive climate studies - it's actually vital. We learned more in the past 50 years of aviation accidents about how weather and changes thereof affect flights - from volcanoes, windshear, microbursts, icing, to many other reasons why planes went down.
The NTSB investigates accidents and provides recommendations. The FAA implements those recommendations, however, in order to do so it might need to rely on NASA for the technology and know-how in order to make informed decisions about equipment and procedures.
NOAA? They're part of the Department of Commerce and they're concerned about how climate can affect the economy. It's a different branch of study. NASA's concerned about how climate can affect the atmosphere (which affects how planes fly through the air). While the missions often overlap, there are things NOAA does that doesn't concern NASA (e.g., NOAA monitors icebergs with Canada - this was established a year after the Titanic sank. But iceberg monitoring isn't important to NASA (since that primarily affects ships at sea). However, how the Arctic and Antarctic ice sheets behave IS since that does have climate implications that could impact flight).
Yeah, it's called the show itself.
This started around 1984, actually - the FCC lessened the rules regarding targeting children. It's what lead to the show-length ads we called cartoons. You know, TV shows like Transformers, GI Joe, My Little Pony, Jem and others. They were basically 30 minute ads in the form of shows. They weren't completely in your face about it like an infomercial, but they were still ads.
And yes, the merchandising IS the reason those shows were produced.
Hell, Hasbro figured it out way back in 1986 when they created the original animated Transformers movie. Its sole goal is to basically get rid of all the existing toys to make room for a new lineup. Kids actually cried out - some from the fact that their entire collection was now "gone", others from the death of Optimus Prime who was so beloved that midway through season 3, Hasbro brought him back.
But yeah, if you grew up in the 80s, most of your cartoon TV programming were actually ads. If you watch the episodes today (thanks to DVD box sets) you actually notice how blatant it is at times.
Oh yeah, this extends to today as well - Transformers, GI Joe, Battleship - those movies Hasbro basically licensed it out for free to Hollywood - the prime consideration is not how well the movies did at the box office (that was Hollywood's problem), but how well Hasbro's sales did.
In the city, there's a (slow) "charging station" located within 10 metres of the road. It's called an "electrical socket" and while 110V 15A is slow charge, the "infrastructure" is plentiful and extremely common.
Of course, public use plugs are extremely rare, but given how many people gather around plugs to charge their smartphones...
Actually, thermal control is a compromise. ARMs have traditionally consumed 1mW/MHz, which is great back when everything was 500MHz or less. These days you have "octacore" processors running at 2.5GHz, you're looking at 10-20W in a tiny package with poor cooling (because Package on Package to put RAM on top of the SoC). Add in everything else and going full tilt you could easily have to deal with 15+W.
Given the thermal resistance of the package, you can easily reach junction temperature (125C) stupidly quickly.
One analysis of a chip I saw had 2 cores going 100%, while cores 3 and 4 had to be thermally limited to 50% to keep the junction temperature down. And it needed to start well before the temperature was reached - or you'll overshoot the temperature.
Then there's the system configuration - is the CPU beside the battery? Then you'd want to keep it from getting too hot (you can still get max junction temperature and be only at 45C at the top because of thermal resistance) . Or use the metal in the screen as a heatsink.
A large amount of heat in a SoC is also conducted away through the balls - ground and power planes that double as heatsinks aren't uncommon.
And don't forget the compliant press who believes shiny should be different.
Because you know what the biggest complaint about iOS6 was? That the UI, which has changed little since iPhone OS 1.0, was "dated" and "outmoded".
UIs SHOULD be incredibly stable - they SHOULD get out of the way. The only way a UI is dated or outmoded is if it gets in the way of the user. (E.g., how iOS used to do notifications).
It's not just UX designers deciding to revamp everything - it's the press that decides that just because your windows look the same for 2 years that it needs redesign.
It's really why Apple bothered to go flat in iOS7, to partially implement it in Mavericks, etc. The press was basically calling out Apple for being stubborn with "stale" UIs.