I havent used a bank for years. I use a Credit Union. I get access to my money with no withdrawal fees at 1000s of ATMs across Australia, almost zero monthly fees (I pay a 75c a month internet banking fee and a $1.50 per month Visa Debit card fee plus a fee if I use an ATM not in the "RediATM network" and that's about it) and an internet banking service that mentions Linux by name in the "supported browsers and operating systems" list. And because its a mutualized institution, there are no shareholders to answer to (the "shareholders" are the account holders of the institution)
I have no idea if such things exist in the USA but if they do, maybe they should be considered as an option for people annoyed with the "lets take all these bad loans, package them with 1 or 2 good loans and use some slight of hand to get the credit ratings people to give these securities an AAA rating so we can sell them to suckers who dont know what they are buying" big banks.
Lets hope Activision will allow the fan-made Space Quest sequel Space Quest 7 to continue as well, its another fan-made follow-on to a Sierra adventure game that was shut down by Vivendi.
If you are in that situation, talk to the Telecommunications Industry Ombudsman. I know someone who was in that situation where TPG said they couldn't give them ADSL but BigPond said they could. They talked to the TIO and ended up on the TPG plan they wanted without needing to pay anything to Telstra (i.e. contract exit fees).
I cant find a cite but thanks to the ACCC, Telstra are legally required to wholesale ADSL1 to any ISP that wants to buy a port from Telstra Wholesale.
For example they could scan all incoming mail being sent to the ISPs mail-servers for viruses (my ISP does this and all I see is a little "we blocked x viruses" notice in my inbox periodically)
Also they can block outgoing port 25 (i.e. prevent spam zombies from sending their spam outside of the ISPs network directly) and limit the amount of mail going out of the ISPs mail server (better yet mandate one of the "secure SMTP" options so that the spam zombie cant relay through the ISPs mail server at all)
And ISPs can use well-maintained blacklists of hosts to refuse to accept mail from (for example there is no reason to accept mail comming from the dynamic home customer IP ranges from ISPs like AT&T, Comcast etc. Most ISPs terms-of-service block running mail servers on home accounts anyway so its not like anyone should be running a legitimate mail server on such IP ranges. Blacklists are not perfect and yes may contain IP addresses that once sent spam but no longer do so but if the blacklist is well-maintained there should be a simple way to get your IP removed.
ISPs also need to stop the practice of redirecting non-existent domains to an ISP error server as such practices make it harder to detect certain kinds of forged email headers AFAIK.
If you are stuck on a RIM or are otherwise only limited to ADSL1, you can still get ADSL from Internode or iiNet. Both ISPs have ADSL1 plans that are better value than matching ADSL1 plans from BigPond.
And both have a reputation for GOOD customer service. (I have seen people who say "I have used both BigPond and iiNet/Internode and I prefer iiNet/Internode")
If you want ADSL2+ and only Telstra has it in the exchange then assuming you are on a "zone 1" exchange (whatever that means) then you should be able to get "Internode Easy Broadband" which delivers 25 times the quota of the Telstra plan at the same price tag.
Only reasons to get Telstra BigPond are: If you cant get ADSL but CAN get Telstra cable or Telstra Velocity fiber If you cant get ADSL or cable and the only wireless provider with coverage is BigPond wireless Or if you are getting some kind of special bundle (e.g. home phone, broadband, TV, mobile phones all on the one account) or really good special deal where it actually DOES beat others like iiNet and Internode on price.
Oh wait, its a direct competitor to eBay owned PayPal. eBay is already trying to come up with justification as to how "PayClick is VERY dangerous because it provides no protection against sellers who take your money and never deliver product so we cannot allow people to pay for eBay auctions with it"
I remember that software on the school Macs (back when the school HAD Macs) And I still remember being able to use some sort of "delete file" option in one of the Microsoft Office for Mac applications to delete the At Ease software file and defeat the software. No clue if they ever solved that loophole.
I have had 2 different routers, both provided by the ISP (TPG Internet). The first was a Dreytek Vigor ADSL1 router with wireless. The second is a NetComm rebadge of a Texas Instruments AR7 router chipset router. I know of quite a few others who have done the same and bought a router directly from the ISP (although in one case, its a 3G UMTS BigPond Wireless Broadband router where Telstra wont let you use anything that they havent specifically approved and locked down)
As for the comment that "ISP provided routers are garbage", at least one ISP (Internode) are saying "we officially support, sell and recommend the Apple AirPort Extreme" for some of their plans (various FTTP trials for example)
I own a NetComm all-in-one router provided to me by my ISP. It does 802.11 b/g WiFi, 4 100mbit Ethernet ports, DSL modem and router functionality (including NAT and DHCP) Its using the Texas Instruments AR7 router chipset and has run perfect since I obtained it (all the problems to date have been faults at the ISPs end, usually the fault of a 3rd party carrier and not the ISP)
One big point being made is that the number of people who are employed in tourism, fishing and other uses of the Gulf of Mexico far outnumber the number of people who are employed on the offshore exploration rigs.
I bought 3 items from ThinkGeek in my only order to them so far. One was some "Cyber Clean Electronics Cleaning Putty" which did nothing much in the way of removing gunk, crumbs etc from my keyboard but had a wierd smell which ended up on the keyboard keys.
One was a PC repair toolkit which so far has done well for all sorts of things (working on computers included)
And the last was a Gorillapod flexible tripod for my digital camera which would work just fine (if I could find it in all this mess:)
The electronics items are for the most part of no use to me, being that they usually work with a US power socket.
The food items sound great but all the good ones (especially anything with lots of caffeine in it) say "we cant ship this to Australia":(
The other problem is that (in the US at least) the providers charge for incoming text messages. So if you get sent a text message you dont want, tough, you paid for it anyway.
Companies that look at "how many customers did you serve" instead of "how much profit did you make for the company" are companies that deserve to go out of business IMO.
Anyone who thinks Java would have died if it wasnt for Android clearly hasn't worked in web development lately where some form of server-side Java such as J2EE (usually paired with an Oracle database) is a very popular choice.
What part of Australia are you in? All the major ADSL ISPs these days (including Telstra) offer plans with generous quotas. The closest I could find to a 1GB ADSL plan was a 2GB plan from BigPond and even then, you can get a better plan from someone else for the same amount of money.
As for wireless, all of the big boys have plans with multi-gigabyte quotas.
Anyone who is on a plan with 1gb is either living somewhere where wireless is the only option available (and is too cheap to buy a plan with more quota) or has been duped into buying an ADSL plan with VERY poor value for money. Or possibly they are on an older grandfathered ADSL plan and cant or wont switch.
The law in question is the Tax Reform Act of 1986. The relavent section of that law was introduced because big tech companies were declaring people as contractors to the IRS (not paying payroll taxes, unemployment, workers comp and other things) when they were clearly employees (with the company providing their workspace/desk/computer/equipment/etc, setting their work hours and defining exactly what work they were doing including being allocated very specific tasks from supervisors)
Congress wanted to close that loophole and and reclaim all the tax that would be paid if those workers were treated as the employees they clearly were.
Also, these "contractors" were able to claim things as tax deductions (tolls paid on the way to and from work, phone and internet costs, car expenses and other things) that as an employee they arent legally allowed to claim. Again it was loophole and again it meant less tax for the government (important since they were cutting tax elsewhere and needed to end up with no net decrease in the total amount of tax the government collected)
I have followed PassWindow ever since it was seen on The New Inventors on Australian TV and I think its a GREAT idea. I for one would LOVE to see my bank offer this on my Visa Debit card.
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The moment Verizon decided that they would require a $30 per month data plan for the Kin, it was dead in the water.
I havent used a bank for years. I use a Credit Union. I get access to my money with no withdrawal fees at 1000s of ATMs across Australia, almost zero monthly fees (I pay a 75c a month internet banking fee and a $1.50 per month Visa Debit card fee plus a fee if I use an ATM not in the "RediATM network" and that's about it) and an internet banking service that mentions Linux by name in the "supported browsers and operating systems" list. And because its a mutualized institution, there are no shareholders to answer to (the "shareholders" are the account holders of the institution)
I have no idea if such things exist in the USA but if they do, maybe they should be considered as an option for people annoyed with the "lets take all these bad loans, package them with 1 or 2 good loans and use some slight of hand to get the credit ratings people to give these securities an AAA rating so we can sell them to suckers who dont know what they are buying" big banks.
Lets hope Activision will allow the fan-made Space Quest sequel Space Quest 7 to continue as well, its another fan-made follow-on to a Sierra adventure game that was shut down by Vivendi.
The problem is is that the hardware decoder in every iPod can decode AAC and MP3 but cant decode Vorbis.
If you are in that situation, talk to the Telecommunications Industry Ombudsman. I know someone who was in that situation where TPG said they couldn't give them ADSL but BigPond said they could. They talked to the TIO and ended up on the TPG plan they wanted without needing to pay anything to Telstra (i.e. contract exit fees).
I cant find a cite but thanks to the ACCC, Telstra are legally required to wholesale ADSL1 to any ISP that wants to buy a port from Telstra Wholesale.
For example they could scan all incoming mail being sent to the ISPs mail-servers for viruses (my ISP does this and all I see is a little "we blocked x viruses" notice in my inbox periodically)
Also they can block outgoing port 25 (i.e. prevent spam zombies from sending their spam outside of the ISPs network directly) and limit the amount of mail going out of the ISPs mail server (better yet mandate one of the "secure SMTP" options so that the spam zombie cant relay through the ISPs mail server at all)
And ISPs can use well-maintained blacklists of hosts to refuse to accept mail from (for example there is no reason to accept mail comming from the dynamic home customer IP ranges from ISPs like AT&T, Comcast etc. Most ISPs terms-of-service block running mail servers on home accounts anyway so its not like anyone should be running a legitimate mail server on such IP ranges.
Blacklists are not perfect and yes may contain IP addresses that once sent spam but no longer do so but if the blacklist is well-maintained there should be a simple way to get your IP removed.
ISPs also need to stop the practice of redirecting non-existent domains to an ISP error server as such practices make it harder to detect certain kinds of forged email headers AFAIK.
If you are stuck on a RIM or are otherwise only limited to ADSL1, you can still get ADSL from Internode or iiNet. Both ISPs have ADSL1 plans that are better value than matching ADSL1 plans from BigPond.
And both have a reputation for GOOD customer service. (I have seen people who say "I have used both BigPond and iiNet/Internode and I prefer iiNet/Internode")
If you want ADSL2+ and only Telstra has it in the exchange then assuming you are on a "zone 1" exchange (whatever that means) then you should be able to get "Internode Easy Broadband" which delivers 25 times the quota of the Telstra plan at the same price tag.
Only reasons to get Telstra BigPond are:
If you cant get ADSL but CAN get Telstra cable or Telstra Velocity fiber
If you cant get ADSL or cable and the only wireless provider with coverage is BigPond wireless
Or if you are getting some kind of special bundle (e.g. home phone, broadband, TV, mobile phones all on the one account) or really good special deal where it actually DOES beat others like iiNet and Internode on price.
Oh wait, its a direct competitor to eBay owned PayPal. eBay is already trying to come up with justification as to how "PayClick is VERY dangerous because it provides no protection against sellers who take your money and never deliver product so we cannot allow people to pay for eBay auctions with it"
I remember that software on the school Macs (back when the school HAD Macs)
And I still remember being able to use some sort of "delete file" option in one of the Microsoft Office for Mac applications to delete the At Ease software file and defeat the software. No clue if they ever solved that loophole.
I have had 2 different routers, both provided by the ISP (TPG Internet). The first was a Dreytek Vigor ADSL1 router with wireless. The second is a NetComm rebadge of a Texas Instruments AR7 router chipset router. I know of quite a few others who have done the same and bought a router directly from the ISP (although in one case, its a 3G UMTS BigPond Wireless Broadband router where Telstra wont let you use anything that they havent specifically approved and locked down)
As for the comment that "ISP provided routers are garbage", at least one ISP (Internode) are saying "we officially support, sell and recommend the Apple AirPort Extreme" for some of their plans (various FTTP trials for example)
I own a NetComm all-in-one router provided to me by my ISP. It does 802.11 b/g WiFi, 4 100mbit Ethernet ports, DSL modem and router functionality (including NAT and DHCP)
Its using the Texas Instruments AR7 router chipset and has run perfect since I obtained it (all the problems to date have been faults at the ISPs end, usually the fault of a 3rd party carrier and not the ISP)
One big point being made is that the number of people who are employed in tourism, fishing and other uses of the Gulf of Mexico far outnumber the number of people who are employed on the offshore exploration rigs.
I bought 3 items from ThinkGeek in my only order to them so far.
One was some "Cyber Clean Electronics Cleaning Putty" which did nothing much in the way of removing gunk, crumbs etc from my keyboard but had a wierd smell which ended up on the keyboard keys.
One was a PC repair toolkit which so far has done well for all sorts of things (working on computers included)
And the last was a Gorillapod flexible tripod for my digital camera which would work just fine (if I could find it in all this mess :)
The electronics items are for the most part of no use to me, being that they usually work with a US power socket.
The food items sound great but all the good ones (especially anything with lots of caffeine in it) say "we cant ship this to Australia" :(
The blackout rules for the NFL are set by the NFL, not by the teams.
The other problem is that (in the US at least) the providers charge for incoming text messages. So if you get sent a text message you dont want, tough, you paid for it anyway.
The question is why do they even HAVE the blocks, given that they make so much money from people accidentally using the services.
Companies that look at "how many customers did you serve" instead of "how much profit did you make for the company" are companies that deserve to go out of business IMO.
Anyone who thinks Java would have died if it wasnt for Android clearly hasn't worked in web development lately where some form of server-side Java such as J2EE (usually paired with an Oracle database) is a very popular choice.
What part of Australia are you in? All the major ADSL ISPs these days (including Telstra) offer plans with generous quotas. The closest I could find to a 1GB ADSL plan was a 2GB plan from BigPond and even then, you can get a better plan from someone else for the same amount of money.
As for wireless, all of the big boys have plans with multi-gigabyte quotas.
Anyone who is on a plan with 1gb is either living somewhere where wireless is the only option available (and is too cheap to buy a plan with more quota) or has been duped into buying an ADSL plan with VERY poor value for money. Or possibly they are on an older grandfathered ADSL plan and cant or wont switch.
Do Canadian cell phone carriers still lock their phones so they will only play ringtones from the carriers store?
If I was going to buy a Laser, I would buy an Epson or a Brother, not a HP.
Yes, HP printers were good once. But the ones you can buy now are NOT (Lasers included)
With all the crap HP are doing lately, you would have to be stupid to buy a HP printer.
Get a printer from a decent company such as Canon or Epson or Brother.
Unfortunatly, the other guy is WORSE.
The law in question is the Tax Reform Act of 1986.
The relavent section of that law was introduced because big tech companies were declaring people as contractors to the IRS (not paying payroll taxes, unemployment, workers comp and other things) when they were clearly employees (with the company providing their workspace/desk/computer/equipment/etc, setting their work hours and defining exactly what work they were doing including being allocated very specific tasks from supervisors)
Congress wanted to close that loophole and and reclaim all the tax that would be paid if those workers were treated as the employees they clearly were.
Also, these "contractors" were able to claim things as tax deductions (tolls paid on the way to and from work, phone and internet costs, car expenses and other things) that as an employee they arent legally allowed to claim. Again it was loophole and again it meant less tax for the government (important since they were cutting tax elsewhere and needed to end up with no net decrease in the total amount of tax the government collected)
I have followed PassWindow ever since it was seen on The New Inventors on Australian TV and I think its a GREAT idea. I for one would LOVE to see my bank offer this on my Visa Debit card.