"But when this experience is a required "rite of passage" in order to own any of their "trophies" (err, I mean "products") I feel a surge of rejection that seems to originate in the vicinity of my stomach."
I'm sorry, but WTF?
The last time I was in an Apple Store (two weeks ago), I was in and out within five minutes, and I didn't even get a "do you want fries with that?" question. It's just a store. In my experience, a store with exceptionally polite staff.
"It just struck me that the main bone BoingBoing had to pick with MagicJack's EULA is that its users' calls are monitored, and are played targeted ads (obtained from said monitoring)."
The EULA does not say that 'calls are monitored', it says that 'Our computers may analyze the phone numbers you call'. I think that's a big difference. BoingBoing did a Slashdot-like editorial move and phrased their headline for maximum outrage and minimum accuracy.
>> Don't forget to charge the kid too. It's the American way. > >As an American, I suppose I should be irritated by that remark... but it's uncomfortably close to the truth. We're not handling many of these cases very well, it seems
When you consider that the majority of 'offenders' prosecuted in this country under child pornography laws are 15-year-olds, I'd say that "not handling well" is somewhat of an understatement.
for all sites that I visited that tried to make me jump through the dumb VbV hoops, I switched to American Express..
I thought and still think that it is dumb to encourage consumers to type confidential information into a random pop-up page from a different web site than the one they are visiting.
I'm sure that enough heat*time will do it, but I suspect that your food isn't food at that point. Autoclaving is insufficient to destroy prions on surgical instruments, for instance.
"Think of your own checks- would you like it if someone you wrote a check to sat on it for 5 years, then cashed it at a time when you least had the ability to pay for it?"
Since my money is generally invested somewhere, yes. I'd love it if I got to collect interest for 5 years on every check I ever wrote. As for the other half of your question, I would think any sensible person would consider the money 'spent' as soon as the check was written, and not spend it on something else.
ATT whines about people leaving for alternative services as if it were inevitable. I don't think it was.
VoIP gave people alternatives to being gouged $25 or $30 a month for just *dialtone*, and people chose. I have a T-Mobile prepaid cell phone and I pay less than that *per year* for the 'dialtone' component.
I'd pay $100/year for a wired circuit and dialtone, but that kind of money just isn't enough for the likes of AT&T.
A. (who has been off the PSTN for a long, long time)
When our provider started having numerous unexplained outages, we quietly deployed equipment to a new provider across town and changed the DNS. I don't even think they asked us why we didn't renew our contract.
There's just no reason to do business with people like this. Leave - as fast as you can.
"You need to be more clear about how this caching might actually take place; there is no magical program that would do this...except for a DNS server."
In Windows, I believe it's called the DNS Client service, on OS X it's called lookupd.
"you are describing your own experience and thinking it has anything to do with everybody's experience"
And you're claiming it has nothing to do to with everyone's experience?
The last time I went to a theater, for any number of reasons I found myself muttering "I can do better than this at home". I bought a projector and a 100" screen. And you know, I was right. I haven't been back since - and I live within walking distance of the local theater.
"Is Apple seriously arguing that installing a third party program and booting OS X results in copyright infringement due to making a derivative work and an unauthorized copy?"
Since Apple's license for OS X says that it can only be run on Apple hardware, the in-memory copy is just as unauthorized as the rest of them.
"Or a current BSD distribution. On old hardware I typically install netbsd. I have tried Minix but the hardware compatibility is not good."
I agree with this. I'm not sure what the philosophy is, but Linux distros seem to throw away knowledge like it was candy. I recently attempted to install Ubuntu on a nice 2000-era laptop. Ubunto apparently doesn't know how to talk to the controller and/or write to the hard drive. I installed FreeBSD 7.2 instead.
"Do you actually have the slightest idea what you just said? I understand that America-bashing is fashionable these days..."
It would help if we didn't make it so easy. Like it or not, America is the gold-standard for 'sex is bad' (and 'skin = sex', therefore 'skin = bad'). Of course we inherited a goodly part of the from our English cousins, which brings us to:
"Ask Alan Turing about how tolerant Europeans can be about sexual orientation."
Alan lived and died in England, where his sexuality was illegal. I'm not sure if England considers themselves 'European' yet, but certainly most countries (not all) in continental Europe were more tolerant about sexual preference 50 years ago than most Americans today.
Slashdot Mirror
"But when this experience is a required "rite of passage" in order to own any of their "trophies" (err, I mean "products") I feel a surge of rejection that seems to originate in the vicinity of my stomach."
I'm sorry, but WTF?
The last time I was in an Apple Store (two weeks ago), I was in and out within five minutes, and I didn't even get a "do you want fries with that?" question. It's just a store. In my experience, a store with exceptionally polite staff.
A.
"The ultimate goal is to beam large amounts of solar power to Earth"
Which eventually turns into heat, which could contribute to global warming, depending on your definition of 'large amounts of power', of course.
A.
"Apple has become the most dickhead company in the industry, far surpassing Microsoft or any other."
Having dealt with Microsoft and used Windows since version 1.0, I have to say that your version of history does not agree with mine.
A.
"It just struck me that the main bone BoingBoing had to pick with MagicJack's EULA is that its users' calls are monitored, and are played targeted ads (obtained from said monitoring)."
The EULA does not say that 'calls are monitored', it says that 'Our computers may analyze the phone numbers you call'. I think that's a big difference. BoingBoing did a Slashdot-like editorial move and phrased their headline for maximum outrage and minimum accuracy.
A.
In 2006, this was called "Serendipitous Chat", which also had it's amusing moments.
A.
>> Don't forget to charge the kid too. It's the American way. ... but it's uncomfortably close to the truth. We're not handling many of these cases very well, it seems
>
>As an American, I suppose I should be irritated by that remark
When you consider that the majority of 'offenders' prosecuted in this country under child pornography laws are 15-year-olds, I'd say that "not handling well" is somewhat of an understatement.
A.
for all sites that I visited that tried to make me jump through the dumb VbV hoops, I switched to American Express..
I thought and still think that it is dumb to encourage consumers to type confidential information into a random pop-up page from a different web site than the one they are visiting.
A.
> There are so many good quotes in that book, that you could make nearly a second book out of them. My favorite...
The one that always sticks in my mind is:
""If there is such a phenomenon as absolute evil, it consists in treating another human being as a thing."
A.
I'm sure that enough heat*time will do it, but I suspect that your food isn't food at that point. Autoclaving is insufficient to destroy prions on surgical instruments, for instance.
A.
"it's late, i'm over tired and maybe i should have cooked that last brain i ate"
Cooking won't help. Prions aren't alive*, cooking them won't kill them.
* depending on your definition of life, of course.
A.
"Think of your own checks- would you like it if someone you wrote a check to sat on it for 5 years, then cashed it at a time when you least had the ability to pay for it?"
Since my money is generally invested somewhere, yes. I'd love it if I got to collect interest for 5 years on every check I ever wrote. As for the other half of your question, I would think any sensible person would consider the money 'spent' as soon as the check was written, and not spend it on something else.
A.
ATT whines about people leaving for alternative services as if it were inevitable. I don't think it was.
VoIP gave people alternatives to being gouged $25 or $30 a month for just *dialtone*, and people chose. I have a T-Mobile prepaid cell phone and I pay less than that *per year* for the 'dialtone' component.
I'd pay $100/year for a wired circuit and dialtone, but that kind of money just isn't enough for the likes of AT&T.
A.
(who has been off the PSTN for a long, long time)
I third this.
When our provider started having numerous unexplained outages, we quietly deployed equipment to a new provider across town and changed the DNS. I don't even think they asked us why we didn't renew our contract.
There's just no reason to do business with people like this. Leave - as fast as you can.
A.
"You need to be more clear about how this caching might actually take place; there is no magical program that would do this...except for a DNS server."
In Windows, I believe it's called the DNS Client service, on OS X it's called lookupd.
A.
It must be, when we're posting stories from 13 years ago.
http://www.washingtoncitypaper.com/display.php?id=10873
The kid is in high school and no longer speaks a word of Klingon.
>I want my email accessible from multiple locations. I can check it at work, at home, on my phone, on the moon, etc.
>
> Name a better alternative.
Running your own IMAP server at home, accessed via SSL/TLS. Something which I (and many others) have done for over a decade.
A.
I may be in the minority, but it's not as 'clear' as you make it out to be:
From earlier this year:
Headline: Study: More Americans Play Games Than Go To Movies
http://www.gamasutra.com/php-bin/news_index.php?story=23719
Those box office receipts you like to tout indicate revenue, not numbers of people.
A.
"you are describing your own experience and thinking it has anything to do with everybody's experience"
And you're claiming it has nothing to do to with everyone's experience?
The last time I went to a theater, for any number of reasons I found myself muttering "I can do better than this at home". I bought a projector and a 100" screen. And you know, I was right. I haven't been back since - and I live within walking distance of the local theater.
A.
"I don't understand why those with PVRs still watch the ads."
I don't understand how people *can* watch the ads.
I know this is somewhat off-topic, but in what universe is bludgeoning me 8 times in an hour *with the same ad*, *in the same show*, a good idea?
A.
(who skips ads, or uses the mute button while watching live TV)
"Is Apple seriously arguing that installing a third party program and booting OS X results in copyright infringement due to making a derivative work and an unauthorized copy?"
Since Apple's license for OS X says that it can only be run on Apple hardware, the in-memory copy is just as unauthorized as the rest of them.
A.
"Or a current BSD distribution. On old hardware I typically install netbsd. I have tried Minix but the hardware compatibility is not good."
I agree with this. I'm not sure what the philosophy is, but Linux distros seem to throw away knowledge like it was candy. I recently attempted to install Ubuntu on a nice 2000-era laptop. Ubunto apparently doesn't know how to talk to the controller and/or write to the hard drive. I installed FreeBSD 7.2 instead.
A.
This is the only sort of lobbying that should be allowed
(imnsho)
A.
This.
I've had an original iPhone since they came out (Summer 2007)
Cellular Network Data sent: 45.2 MB. Data received: 153 MB.
(last reset 'never', unless an OS upgrade did it)
A.
(who thinks that AT&T is a victim of the iPhone's (and their) success, nothing more)
"Do you actually have the slightest idea what you just said? I understand that America-bashing is fashionable these days..."
It would help if we didn't make it so easy. Like it or not, America is the gold-standard for 'sex is bad' (and 'skin = sex', therefore 'skin = bad'). Of course we inherited a goodly part of the from our English cousins, which brings us to:
"Ask Alan Turing about how tolerant Europeans can be about sexual orientation."
Alan lived and died in England, where his sexuality was illegal. I'm not sure if England considers themselves 'European' yet, but certainly most countries (not all) in continental Europe were more tolerant about sexual preference 50 years ago than most Americans today.
A.
"Congrats, there is a Mac version available as well."
The Mac version appears to be software install only, not the BIOS-resident version. Apple is not listed as a partner on the web site.
A.