Interested comment from an Anonymous Coward, who is too scared to stand behind their words.
The fact is that numerous polls in many countries including the USA show that there is unfortunately significant public support for increasing police powers and decreasing oversight.
Keep in mind that these same idiots also vote for the same corrupt politicians from the same corrupt parties as well.
When the sheeple finally reach their breaking point and have enough, they end up supporting whatever nut cases can best sell them the simplest counter-production solution which best promotes the fantasy that they can have their cake and eat it too. (Think USA rightist tea parties and Greek syriza leftists.)
police support the creation and advancement of police states. Also in other news, water is wet.
Nothing to see here folks.
The issue is not with the police, which more often than not support doing away with any pesky human rights and oversight which make it "harder" for them to do their jobs, but with the cowardly sheeple who empower them by happily give up their freedom every time some they hear someone say boo.
Yes terrorism is horrible, but lots of other risks in life are much more deadly, including gun culture, obesity and processed foods industry, poverty, insufficient vaccination and medical treatment, etc. And yet very little is done to address these other issues since steeples don't consider them as scary.
Strange that we were able to defeat the Nazi horrors without having to resort to creating our own police states, in which every citizen is monitored and they activity permanently archived.
Mathematica use to run great offline on Win 3.1 on 486 platforms, which have a small fraction of the capability and resources of a modern smart phone.
True that the current version of mathematica does so much more, but even an older strip download offline version would be so much more than the countless Android & iOS CAS apps in the App/Play stores.
I purchased Wolfram Alpha which is decent for compution, but often when I need it most, especially for big number modulo calculations, I don't have an Internet connection. Plus a stand alone mathematica would be best for importing and running M language scripts.
If a standalone offline version of mathematica was available for Android, I would be one of the first to purchase it.
Why on earth would anyone want open hardware, when they can get the latest Intel chips offer vPro and ATM (Active Management Technology) which provides government mandated (via NSL) hardware backdoors? It is a lot harder to hide wireless spying in open hardware, which makes it useless to me.
I personally prefer these new Intel chips, because I like knowing that big brother has full remote access to my computers, independent of OS and disk encryption, in case I do anything in the future which upsets them.
Now excuse me, while I surrender to the authorities for thought crimes in my sleep, which someone told me that I might have.
All of these type of models about the universe have elegant math behind them.
But until they can any observable predictions which can be measured and possibly falsifiable, then we are really dealing with pure math and philosophy and not physics.
One can construct countless mathematical models which fit known observations, but very few make new falsifiable observable predictions.
This is my gripe with something like String/M-Theory, which has not made any legitimate predictions, and fails at stuff like monopoles which not been observed.
I don't understand. It seems that there is a clear-cut case for GNOME, that should guarantee victory.
How come in the USA with its huge surplus of lawyers, they aren't some willing to take the case for free, in exchange for a percentage of damages against a publicly traded company like GroupOn? I am surprised that a publicly traded company would take such a risk which could diminish shareholder value.
Or it only scumbags like SCO/Novel which are allowed to sue?
All that is needed would be for new "climate change industrial complex" consisting of industries with huge growth potentials from climate change after-effects (such as dike/levee builders, water management including reclaimation & desalination, fertilisers for new growing regions with marginal soil, mega construction for displaced infrastructure, etc.) to make more money then the coal and petroleum industries. It may not sound like much, but many trillions of dollars will be needed for this.
Then they will be able to give/bribe more money to politicians, who will the universally accept climate change as fact and change the public perception.
Until then there is enough money from a new "climate change industrial complex", public doubt will remain.
Just think of all of the crimes we can prevent or solve, if we place the entire American population in prison camps, with 24/7 monitoring, restricted movement, restricted access to information, and public displays of punitive punishment.
Why is this not being done? Won't someone please think of the children?
North Korea has show the world the way to the future, with our increasing plutocratic societies in the west with decreasing human rights.
I still need an offline mapping solution for Japan and South Korea, for upcoming trips, which are not supported by Nokia Here.
Any suggestion if there is any way to get an OpenStreetMap viewer and offline Japan+SouthKorea maps, which will work in one of these platforms: WindowsPhone8.1, iOS, Android, or desktop Ubuntu Linux? Thx.
I recently picked up a cheap refurbished factory unlocked Nokia Lumia as a secondary phone, specifically for the free Offline Nokia Here Drive+Maps support. Considering the expense of getting a TomTom, Garmin, or iGO dedicated GPS unit with world map coverage plus unlimited updates, the Nokia Lumia was a much cheaper option. Having factory unlock, also allows me to purchase inexpensive micro-SIM GSM cards when travelling to avoid costly roaming charges.
In fact, in my most recent trip to Europe, I used it specifically for drive navigation with a cheap removable phone bracket, and it worked just as good as dedicated GPS. Saving me much more than the cost of this phone compared to renting GPS navigation for 2 weeks from the car rental company.
Furthermore, my Nokia phone is lighter, slimmer, and has better (> 720p) display than dedicated GPS. Furthermore, Nokia Here Maps, it also works great when walking around the city, looking for hotel and other POI.
My only complaint is that despite having offline maps for just about every significant country, South Korea and Japan are suspiciously missing, even though I really need them.:(
My biggest compliant with Windows Phone 8.1, running on my Nokia Lumia, is the lack of local offline backups (since I don't trust the cloud with my data), and device client certificate management needed for S/MIME, Wireless WPA-Enterprise, web client certificates, etc. Both of these are features are fully supported for years on iOS and Android, but Windows Phone 8.1 requires sending up MDM (Mobile Device Management Server) on WIndows 8.* to manage PKI externally, as oppose to on the device locally like iOS and Android do.
For my next primary phone, I have want a phablet, and have been on the fence between upcoming iPhone 6 (with large 5.5" of higher display) or Samsung Galaxy Note 4, both hopefully available by the end of this year.
Havinvg Nokia Here Drive+Maps with free downloadable offline maps on the upcoming Samsung Galaxy Note 4 would be enough to tip the scales away from iPhone 6.
I currently have a Surface Pro2 with Ubuntu running. It is my first non-Apple computer in more than 10 years. Which I bought reluctantly when my previous MacBook died and did not like any of the current out-dated models.
For the most part, everything in Ubuntu runs great on the Surface Pro2, except Wi-Fi which is flaky due to sucky proprietary Marvell drivers.
In any case, it is now my primary work computer, and I am very happy with it, although I do really like the newer Surface Pro3 with larger screen and better kickstand.
Apple MacBook Airs are horrible out of date compared to Surface Pro2 & Pro3. No retina display, no touch display, and no pen input. And I trust Linux much more that NSA backdoor'ed OSX and Windows.
The fact is that Microsoft is now making excellent laptop/tablet hardware, even though their OS has issues. I wish that people look at things objectively and stop giving praise to a company that use to innovate but now refuses to upgrade hardware to meet customer's needs. (I am still
Not to mention the horrible amount of water, fertilisers, pesticides, and land tracts golf courses require for their "prefect" greens. Heck, with so many people using golf carts, and caddies carrying golf bags, most people playing golf aren't even getting sufficient exercise.
Mini golf, and basically every other non-motorised sport, are by far much more environmentally friendly then golf.
In many places, it is known as the sport of the "white old mens club" (figure of speech) or the 1%, because of the restricted club memberships, expensive green fees, and huge variation in equipment costs, which can be in the thousands of dollars for a single decent club.
Considering the deliberate spying Nokia does on their Windows phone, it seems that their NSA masters asked them to find a way to help spy on android devices.
Next, the NSA will talk to HTC, Samsung, Motorola, etc, forcing them to do the same, now that the precedence with Nokia has been established and accomplished on the Android platform.
Post Snowden, there isn't enough tin foil for my hats these days, since the revelations have shown that the NSA and corporations have been spying much more then the worse case proposed by the nuttiest crackpots, who are turning out to be the most insightful.
I am upset with the timing and principle of this action, which the news outlets are promoting as a death-nail in net neutrality.
I have visited China enough to know what it is like not to have net neutrality. It is a shame that the country which created the Internet will likely follow the same path.
Here is hoping that government regulators either allow real competition for consumer Internet service, and also list ISP as common carriers. Unfortunately, this is unlikely to happen, since there isn't any pool of consumer money available to bribe politicians more than they are being bribed with now by the current provider monopolies (like Comcast, AT&T, etc.).
As a NetFlix streaming subscriber, I will cancel my membership Monday morning.
I don't have Comcast and refuse to pay some of my upcoming Netflix fees to undermine net anti-discrimination (otherwise know as net neutrality).
I was previously happy with and supported Netflix standing up to the Internet monopolies, but now this sets a horrible precedence.
I only hope now that other Netflix subscribers do the same, and cancel their service/subscription, to give the message to other companies that undermining the Internet has consequences.
Considering that apple out-sourced all of their manufacturing overseas, it seems that China and not the USA should be the ones honouring Steve Jobs with a stamp.
Alternatively, if the USPS wants to honour Steve Jobs in a historically accurate way, they could design the stamp in the USA, have China produce the stamps, and then sell those Chinese made stamps to Americans.
This sounds like it would be prefect for implantable devices, that could leach off excess sugar in the blood.
With the high sugar content in western diets, one could both power implanted devices, plus prevent and treat diabetes by keeping blood sugar levels down to reasonable levels. It could act like an artificial pancreas, plus power a pacemaker, and maybe let you use a computer in your head. (Why isn't the NSA funding this, to stop thought crimes?)
Seems to me a much easier solution than forcing the political powerful processed food and fast food industries to cut back on sugar and syrup that are poisoning consumers.
There was never any safety issues with using a cell phone anytime during flight. If there was, don't you think that planes would be dropping like flies from every nutcase and terrorist turing on (or leaving on) their cell phones?
It was disallowed because it cut into airline revenue from expensive airplane to satellite phones. However now that airlines are deploying micro-cells, with huge roaming fees, guess with, its now magically time to remove cell phone restrictions. But only when the planes are above 10000 feet, in order to allow these micro-cells to override ground based cell towers, and insure roaming revenue.
Below 10000 feet, the in-flight cell phone ban must remain in place, since it is much easier to bypass the micro-cells in planes and connect directly (and cheaply) to a ground based cell towers.
Rather than do this incremental changes, why don't the airlines simply jump to their end game: drug economy class passengers, slap diapers on them, and put them in cargo?
I am sure that people are working on promoting this as a anti-terrorist measure. (Won't someone think of the children?) Kind of reminds me of slowly boiling a frog in water, except we are the frogs.
If only we had decent high-speed rail options in North America. Whenever I fly to Europe, I typically take direct flights to hubs such as Frankfurt which have convenient rail stations, and then take a high speed train to my target city, if the train ride is less than 5 hours. (It is usually the cheaper and more convenient option, that takes the same amount of time, since it takes you straight to the city center, and avoids going through European airport security, waiting for a connecting flight, and taking another train to get from the airport to the city.)
What is to prevent some enterprising individuals from capturing a number of these, and selling them on eBay? Reminds me of Pokemon, "gotta catch them all".
Each drone would be likely worth hundreds, if not thousands, of dollars, and would be a tempting target for thieves. Even the stripped down electronics are worth it, and one can easily remove any batteries/fuel, or toss them into a metallic mesh box, to shut down or block any tracking signals, before the tracking units are removed in a distant location.
Military and spy drones always operate at great heights, except for takeoffs and landings at secure locations. In comparison, these delivery drones are required to fly quite low, or even land, in insecure areas, when dropping off packages, in order to avoid injuring the recipients and by-standards. At this point could be easily captured by people on the ground the long nets.
The only way to avoid this would be to have people following these delivery drones, at which point it becomes easier and cheaper just to let these people simply hand-deliver these packages without any drones.
The American public, and also the rest of the world, need more whistle-blowers to leak illegal activity and overreach by self-serving secret agencies, that refuse to allow themselves to be subjected to proper and transparent oversight.
No law abiding person has any issues with spying on suspected individuals and organisations with just cause and court order. But most people do not want a dictatoral police-state based wholesale surveillance on everyone, as we have now.
How is what the NSA is doing in the USA now any different than what the former East German secret police use to do, with their secret files kept on ever individual, so that they can use any individual's past as a weapon, in case they get out of line?
Nor do we want to see security, such as encryption, weakened, if it makes the public more vulnerable to attack by bad/evil organisations in general, or makes it harder for honest and lawful people to cooperate for the benefit of society, even if it means letting a few bad people get away. Proper security requires risk-benefit analysis for the whole of society, not just selected groups.
I can't agree more. I find Jailboken iOS much more capable that Android, and was really hoping for an Apple phablet.
Yes, I understand that phablets are not for everyone, but they fit nicely in my purses and I typically spent much more time running apps than talking, on my smart phone, so the larger size is better for me.
In any case, today's announcement from Apple is so disappointing, that I am now planning to ditch the iPhone and get a Samsung Note3 as my next phone, which has larger size, 1080p display, NFC, and pen when detailed input is needed.
It is a shame that Apple is no longer willing to meet the needs of a long time loyal customer like myself. Besides, I consider the fingerprint reader to be a big negative, and do not want share it with the NSA.
I am also seriously considering the Surface Pro 2 as my next ultrabook, since Apple refuses to make a MacBook Air with retina and touch+pen inputs. (I do a lot of CAD work.)
When I powered cycled my ChromeCast a couple of hours ago, I noticed that it installed a new update.
I then launch my Chrome browser and open several local files of type MP4 (video), PDF, and PPT (powerpoint), and I am still able to successfully cast these to my ChromeCast on my HDTV, with this type of URL:
file://{LOCAL_DIRECTORY}/{LOCAL_FILE}
Even the MP4 video plays nice on my HDTV in FullScreen.
I have not had time to do a packet inspection yet via WireShark, so I cannot speak about the complexity of the protocol used to transmit the content locally.
I am not denying that something with ChromeCast might have changed, since the author is likely telling the truth, and may have been using some "hack" or trick that they used to simplify incorporating their 3rd party support.
But considering that I have my Chrome browser at version 29.0.1547.57 which was not updated in the last 5 days, I would think that any 3rd party app could still be modified to support ChromeCast with the same protocol used by the Chrome browser, NetFlix, YouTube, etc.
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Interested comment from an Anonymous Coward, who is too scared to stand behind their words.
The fact is that numerous polls in many countries including the USA show that there is unfortunately significant public support for increasing police powers and decreasing oversight.
Keep in mind that these same idiots also vote for the same corrupt politicians from the same corrupt parties as well.
When the sheeple finally reach their breaking point and have enough, they end up supporting whatever nut cases can best sell them the simplest counter-production solution which best promotes the fantasy that they can have their cake and eat it too. (Think USA rightist tea parties and Greek syriza leftists.)
police support the creation and advancement of police states. Also in other news, water is wet.
Nothing to see here folks.
The issue is not with the police, which more often than not support doing away with any pesky human rights and oversight which make it "harder" for them to do their jobs, but with the cowardly sheeple who empower them by happily give up their freedom every time some they hear someone say boo.
Yes terrorism is horrible, but lots of other risks in life are much more deadly, including gun culture, obesity and processed foods industry, poverty, insufficient vaccination and medical treatment, etc. And yet very little is done to address these other issues since steeples don't consider them as scary.
Strange that we were able to defeat the Nazi horrors without having to resort to creating our own police states, in which every citizen is monitored and they activity permanently archived.
Mathematica use to run great offline on Win 3.1 on 486 platforms, which have a small fraction of the capability and resources of a modern smart phone.
True that the current version of mathematica does so much more, but even an older strip download offline version would be so much more than the countless Android & iOS CAS apps in the App/Play stores.
I purchased Wolfram Alpha which is decent for compution, but often when I need it most, especially for big number modulo calculations, I don't have an Internet connection. Plus a stand alone mathematica would be best for importing and running M language scripts.
If a standalone offline version of mathematica was available for Android, I would be one of the first to purchase it.
Why on earth would anyone want open hardware, when they can get the latest Intel chips offer vPro and ATM (Active Management Technology) which provides government mandated (via NSL) hardware backdoors? It is a lot harder to hide wireless spying in open hardware, which makes it useless to me.
I personally prefer these new Intel chips, because I like knowing that big brother has full remote access to my computers, independent of OS and disk encryption, in case I do anything in the future which upsets them.
Now excuse me, while I surrender to the authorities for thought crimes in my sleep, which someone told me that I might have.
All of these type of models about the universe have elegant math behind them.
But until they can any observable predictions which can be measured and possibly falsifiable, then we are really dealing with pure math and philosophy and not physics.
One can construct countless mathematical models which fit known observations, but very few make new falsifiable observable predictions.
This is my gripe with something like String/M-Theory, which has not made any legitimate predictions, and fails at stuff like monopoles which not been observed.
Having bubbles in ones bloodstream is extremely dangerous, and potentially fatal. Just ask any informed scuba diver about the biggest risk they face.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/D...
Even worse, there is evidence that bubbles in the bloodstream get covered by platelets, resulting in cumulative neurological damage.
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pm...
https://www.uhms.org/images/DC...
The damaged caused by bubbles in the bloodstream will typically outweigh any medical benefit from this type of drug/vaccine delivery.
I don't understand. It seems that there is a clear-cut case for GNOME, that should guarantee victory.
How come in the USA with its huge surplus of lawyers, they aren't some willing to take the case for free, in exchange for a percentage of damages against a publicly traded company like GroupOn? I am surprised that a publicly traded company would take such a risk which could diminish shareholder value.
Or it only scumbags like SCO/Novel which are allowed to sue?
All that is needed would be for new "climate change industrial complex" consisting of industries with huge growth potentials from climate change after-effects (such as dike/levee builders, water management including reclaimation & desalination, fertilisers for new growing regions with marginal soil, mega construction for displaced infrastructure, etc.) to make more money then the coal and petroleum industries. It may not sound like much, but many trillions of dollars will be needed for this.
Then they will be able to give/bribe more money to politicians, who will the universally accept climate change as fact and change the public perception.
Until then there is enough money from a new "climate change industrial complex", public doubt will remain.
Just think of all of the crimes we can prevent or solve, if we place the entire American population in prison camps, with 24/7 monitoring, restricted movement, restricted access to information, and public displays of punitive punishment.
Why is this not being done? Won't someone please think of the children?
North Korea has show the world the way to the future, with our increasing plutocratic societies in the west with decreasing human rights.
Skip Discovery and learn more from about anacondas from a music video parody:
http://www.collegehumor.com/vi...
Sure not all the facts are correct, but still more accurate than Discovery.
I still need an offline mapping solution for Japan and South Korea, for upcoming trips, which are not supported by Nokia Here.
Any suggestion if there is any way to get an OpenStreetMap viewer and offline Japan+SouthKorea maps, which will work in one of these platforms: WindowsPhone8.1, iOS, Android, or desktop Ubuntu Linux? Thx.
I recently picked up a cheap refurbished factory unlocked Nokia Lumia as a secondary phone, specifically for the free Offline Nokia Here Drive+Maps support. Considering the expense of getting a TomTom, Garmin, or iGO dedicated GPS unit with world map coverage plus unlimited updates, the Nokia Lumia was a much cheaper option. Having factory unlock, also allows me to purchase inexpensive micro-SIM GSM cards when travelling to avoid costly roaming charges.
In fact, in my most recent trip to Europe, I used it specifically for drive navigation with a cheap removable phone bracket, and it worked just as good as dedicated GPS. Saving me much more than the cost of this phone compared to renting GPS navigation for 2 weeks from the car rental company.
Furthermore, my Nokia phone is lighter, slimmer, and has better (> 720p) display than dedicated GPS. Furthermore, Nokia Here Maps, it also works great when walking around the city, looking for hotel and other POI.
My only complaint is that despite having offline maps for just about every significant country, South Korea and Japan are suspiciously missing, even though I really need them. :(
My biggest compliant with Windows Phone 8.1, running on my Nokia Lumia, is the lack of local offline backups (since I don't trust the cloud with my data), and device client certificate management needed for S/MIME, Wireless WPA-Enterprise, web client certificates, etc. Both of these are features are fully supported for years on iOS and Android, but Windows Phone 8.1 requires sending up MDM (Mobile Device Management Server) on WIndows 8.* to manage PKI externally, as oppose to on the device locally like iOS and Android do.
For my next primary phone, I have want a phablet, and have been on the fence between upcoming iPhone 6 (with large 5.5" of higher display) or Samsung Galaxy Note 4, both hopefully available by the end of this year.
Havinvg Nokia Here Drive+Maps with free downloadable offline maps on the upcoming Samsung Galaxy Note 4 would be enough to tip the scales away from iPhone 6.
I currently have a Surface Pro2 with Ubuntu running. It is my first non-Apple computer in more than 10 years. Which I bought reluctantly when my previous MacBook died and did not like any of the current out-dated models.
For the most part, everything in Ubuntu runs great on the Surface Pro2, except Wi-Fi which is flaky due to sucky proprietary Marvell drivers.
In any case, it is now my primary work computer, and I am very happy with it, although I do really like the newer Surface Pro3 with larger screen and better kickstand.
Apple MacBook Airs are horrible out of date compared to Surface Pro2 & Pro3. No retina display, no touch display, and no pen input. And I trust Linux much more that NSA backdoor'ed OSX and Windows.
The fact is that Microsoft is now making excellent laptop/tablet hardware, even though their OS has issues. I wish that people look at things objectively and stop giving praise to a company that use to innovate but now refuses to upgrade hardware to meet customer's needs. (I am still
Not to mention the horrible amount of water, fertilisers, pesticides, and land tracts golf courses require for their "prefect" greens. Heck, with so many people using golf carts, and caddies carrying golf bags, most people playing golf aren't even getting sufficient exercise.
Mini golf, and basically every other non-motorised sport, are by far much more environmentally friendly then golf.
In many places, it is known as the sport of the "white old mens club" (figure of speech) or the 1%, because of the restricted club memberships, expensive green fees, and huge variation in equipment costs, which can be in the thousands of dollars for a single decent club.
Considering the deliberate spying Nokia does on their Windows phone, it seems that their NSA masters asked them to find a way to help spy on android devices.
Next, the NSA will talk to HTC, Samsung, Motorola, etc, forcing them to do the same, now that the precedence with Nokia has been established and accomplished on the Android platform.
Post Snowden, there isn't enough tin foil for my hats these days, since the revelations have shown that the NSA and corporations have been spying much more then the worse case proposed by the nuttiest crackpots, who are turning out to be the most insightful.
I am upset with the timing and principle of this action, which the news outlets are promoting as a death-nail in net neutrality.
I have visited China enough to know what it is like not to have net neutrality. It is a shame that the country which created the Internet will likely follow the same path.
Here is hoping that government regulators either allow real competition for consumer Internet service, and also list ISP as common carriers. Unfortunately, this is unlikely to happen, since there isn't any pool of consumer money available to bribe politicians more than they are being bribed with now by the current provider monopolies (like Comcast, AT&T, etc.).
As a NetFlix streaming subscriber, I will cancel my membership Monday morning.
I don't have Comcast and refuse to pay some of my upcoming Netflix fees to undermine net anti-discrimination (otherwise know as net neutrality).
I was previously happy with and supported Netflix standing up to the Internet monopolies, but now this sets a horrible precedence.
I only hope now that other Netflix subscribers do the same, and cancel their service/subscription, to give the message to other companies that undermining the Internet has consequences.
Considering that apple out-sourced all of their manufacturing overseas, it seems that China and not the USA should be the ones honouring Steve Jobs with a stamp.
Alternatively, if the USPS wants to honour Steve Jobs in a historically accurate way, they could design the stamp in the USA, have China produce the stamps, and then sell those Chinese made stamps to Americans.
This sounds like it would be prefect for implantable devices, that could leach off excess sugar in the blood.
With the high sugar content in western diets, one could both power implanted devices, plus prevent and treat diabetes by keeping blood sugar levels down to reasonable levels. It could act like an artificial pancreas, plus power a pacemaker, and maybe let you use a computer in your head. (Why isn't the NSA funding this, to stop thought crimes?)
Seems to me a much easier solution than forcing the political powerful processed food and fast food industries to cut back on sugar and syrup that are poisoning consumers.
There was never any safety issues with using a cell phone anytime during flight. If there was, don't you think that planes would be dropping like flies from every nutcase and terrorist turing on (or leaving on) their cell phones?
It was disallowed because it cut into airline revenue from expensive airplane to satellite phones. However now that airlines are deploying micro-cells, with huge roaming fees, guess with, its now magically time to remove cell phone restrictions. But only when the planes are above 10000 feet, in order to allow these micro-cells to override ground based cell towers, and insure roaming revenue.
Below 10000 feet, the in-flight cell phone ban must remain in place, since it is much easier to bypass the micro-cells in planes and connect directly (and cheaply) to a ground based cell towers.
Rather than do this incremental changes, why don't the airlines simply jump to their end game: drug economy class passengers, slap diapers on them, and put them in cargo?
I am sure that people are working on promoting this as a anti-terrorist measure. (Won't someone think of the children?) Kind of reminds me of slowly boiling a frog in water, except we are the frogs.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Boiling_frog
If only we had decent high-speed rail options in North America. Whenever I fly to Europe, I typically take direct flights to hubs such as Frankfurt which have convenient rail stations, and then take a high speed train to my target city, if the train ride is less than 5 hours. (It is usually the cheaper and more convenient option, that takes the same amount of time, since it takes you straight to the city center, and avoids going through European airport security, waiting for a connecting flight, and taking another train to get from the airport to the city.)
What is to prevent some enterprising individuals from capturing a number of these, and selling them on eBay? Reminds me of Pokemon, "gotta catch them all".
Each drone would be likely worth hundreds, if not thousands, of dollars, and would be a tempting target for thieves. Even the stripped down electronics are worth it, and one can easily remove any batteries/fuel, or toss them into a metallic mesh box, to shut down or block any tracking signals, before the tracking units are removed in a distant location.
Military and spy drones always operate at great heights, except for takeoffs and landings at secure locations. In comparison, these delivery drones are required to fly quite low, or even land, in insecure areas, when dropping off packages, in order to avoid injuring the recipients and by-standards. At this point could be easily captured by people on the ground the long nets.
The only way to avoid this would be to have people following these delivery drones, at which point it becomes easier and cheaper just to let these people simply hand-deliver these packages without any drones.
The American public, and also the rest of the world, need more whistle-blowers to leak illegal activity and overreach by self-serving secret agencies, that refuse to allow themselves to be subjected to proper and transparent oversight.
No law abiding person has any issues with spying on suspected individuals and organisations with just cause and court order. But most people do not want a dictatoral police-state based wholesale surveillance on everyone, as we have now.
How is what the NSA is doing in the USA now any different than what the former East German secret police use to do, with their secret files kept on ever individual, so that they can use any individual's past as a weapon, in case they get out of line?
Nor do we want to see security, such as encryption, weakened, if it makes the public more vulnerable to attack by bad/evil organisations in general, or makes it harder for honest and lawful people to cooperate for the benefit of society, even if it means letting a few bad people get away. Proper security requires risk-benefit analysis for the whole of society, not just selected groups.
I can't agree more. I find Jailboken iOS much more capable that Android, and was really hoping for an Apple phablet.
Yes, I understand that phablets are not for everyone, but they fit nicely in my purses and I typically spent much more time running apps than talking, on my smart phone, so the larger size is better for me.
In any case, today's announcement from Apple is so disappointing, that I am now planning to ditch the iPhone and get a Samsung Note3 as my next phone, which has larger size, 1080p display, NFC, and pen when detailed input is needed.
It is a shame that Apple is no longer willing to meet the needs of a long time loyal customer like myself. Besides, I consider the fingerprint reader to be a big negative, and do not want share it with the NSA.
I am also seriously considering the Surface Pro 2 as my next ultrabook, since Apple refuses to make a MacBook Air with retina and touch+pen inputs. (I do a lot of CAD work.)
When I powered cycled my ChromeCast a couple of hours ago, I noticed that it installed a new update.
I then launch my Chrome browser and open several local files of type MP4 (video), PDF, and PPT (powerpoint), and I am still able to successfully cast these to my ChromeCast on my HDTV, with this type of URL:
file://{LOCAL_DIRECTORY}/{LOCAL_FILE}
Even the MP4 video plays nice on my HDTV in FullScreen.
I have not had time to do a packet inspection yet via WireShark, so I cannot speak about the complexity of the protocol used to transmit the content locally.
I am not denying that something with ChromeCast might have changed, since the author is likely telling the truth, and may have been using some "hack" or trick that they used to simplify incorporating their 3rd party support.
But considering that I have my Chrome browser at version 29.0.1547.57 which was not updated in the last 5 days, I would think that any 3rd party app could still be modified to support ChromeCast with the same protocol used by the Chrome browser, NetFlix, YouTube, etc.