The Blackberry was designed to send and receive email wirelessly and it has had bits and pieces tacked on to it since then. If I'm not mistaken, the first incarnation of it was without a phone, then the phone was added, then color, they threw some games in there somewhere... it's like a screwdriver with a hammer and scissors attached to it..
The only thing it has going for it is the push email. My MS Smartphone receives email but only when it connects and checks my mailbox. Maybe if I had an important email that was received 1 minute after it just checked, I'd have to wait 29 more minutes to have it automatically check again. If my almost half-hour were THAT important to me, I would consider a BB.
You're right though.. they SUCK as a PDA but that's because they aren't supposed to be PDAs. It's an email terminal and nothing else. The user interface is complete crap, the scroll wheel is impossible to get used to. The only thing it does well is make and receive calls and email push.
Huh? This device is designed to stop kids from loitering.. maybe to send them home?
I would put up with the noise this thing generates (I'm 29 but my hearing is still well above average) to walk in to a 7-11, buy my stuff and leave without having to worry about the intentions (if any) of the people hanging around out front.
Yeah, no kidding on Linux installs... I loaded Kubuntu on my laptop last week and had to reload it because it just didn't detect the wireless card at all. Second load was fine, though. Also had another problem with the same ditro on a desktop where in Kate the current line highlight bar was black instead of transparent. A reload fixed that as well.
Back to the subject of the Xbox. It's normal and expected to have a small number of defective machines - that's why they have a warranty. With the CPU, GPU, RAM for both, ROM for the OS, all of the various logic chips and the power supply involved - I'm surprised that anything that complex works at all half the time.
No kidding... I never thought I could burn a cd on my PC. I also never thought I could justify a $1000 DVD burner. How is this any more unreasonable than that?
Hey, I just want to thank you for mentioning FloydSSH! I have been looking for a decent SSH client for my Audiovox SMT5600 and you may be interested in what I found by way of your suggestion:
MidpSSH is an integrated telnet/SSH client with lots of display options, a phonebook (!!) and seems to be very stable. I'm only having one problem though - I can telnet fine, I can SSH to my Smoothwall firewall but I can't SSH to my OSX box... Granted it's only been 10 minutes of fiddling so far so I may be overlooking something.
Only problem with it so far is that the vibrator in my phone goes off when I move the direction pad.. very odd to say the least.
Of all the people I know who own an Xbox, which is a dozen or so - most play with the composite cable included in the kit. Some, like myself, bought an S-Video cable - even if they own a HDTV, which I don't have. One person I know is using component inputs and the digital audio out. Of all these people, two own a HDTV and one has an EDTV but he uses composite in.
Those numbers are pretty ugly when you think about it. Two out of 12 people give a damn enough to buy a brand new TV and one of those two bothered to buy the component cable. By the way, the one who bought the HD cable also sold his HDTV because he just doesn't watch TV enough to justify a gigantic TV in his condo.
I don't think that HDTV/console gaming is at a big enough saturation to compel Nintendo to include HDTV support. They make money hand over fist so I'm sure they believe this is the best way to market the machine but I can only guess that adding HDTV support and just selling the cable seperately would only tack on an extra $10-15 bucks.
The delicious irony in that is that titles like, "Healthy in Paranoid Times," "Get Right With the Man," "Nothing is Sound," "The Invisible Invasion," "Phantoms," "Life in Agony," and "Suspicious Activity" all install the rootkit and compromise your computer.
I think I was mean to him in a comment a few articles back when I asked him if he lived here or not because his comments were always on point and extremely fast.
That assumes that downloading an MP3 or a DivX file is a physical transaction. When I download a copy of "Corpse Bride" for my wife because we have no intention of shelling out $15 for tickets, finding a sitter, blah blah, movie wasn't even that good, blah... a copy of it doesn't disappear off of a shelf for a "joyride" and then "poof" it's back on the shelf in a couple hours.
Same thing when I record a copy of Amazing race or download the first episode because my in-laws missed it. I'll admit that they are losing revenue on the movie by us not trekking to the local googolplex but we probably wouldn't go anyway. My opinion of P2P is that I get a lower-quality product for free and if I really want to get the super-high-def experience, I'll pull my wallet out and cough up the bucks.
The article is a little vague... if, say, Cingular is the company trying to put the DMCA on the unlocker, they don't have a leg to stand on. The carrier asks the manufacturer to subsidy-lock the phones to their SIM cards and that's all the say they have in locking. The manufacturer is the one who would prosecute because in certain circumstances, unlocking software comes from questionable sources.
I went around and around to get a phone repaired through Motorola. They sent me an ATTWS branded phone that wouldn't work with my ATTWS SIM card. First reaction I had was to call ATTWS, they told me they don't have the unlock codes and I need to call Motorola. Calling Motorola gave me the same runaround, THEY don't have the codes, ATTWS does! I finally spoke to someone in the Consumer Advocacy group in Moto and they gave me the unlock code in about 5 minutes. I'm sure ATTWS had the codes but that would kill their business model if they allowed someone to put another SIM card in!
PS: It was a quad-band "World" phone which meant I could use it anywhere in the "world" with ATTWS's SIM and international roaming rates. Not that I did but if I wanted to use it with a prepaid SIM in Europe, I couldn't - even if I was still paying ATTWS each month under contract.
Cellular providers sell the subsidized phones with the expectation that they will recoup their losses during the term of the contract. Nothing wrong there. It's when they lock the phones AND slap you with a ~$200 fee for breaking the contract that it bothers me. The only phones, IMHO, that should be locked are PAYGO (pay as you go) and that's because they are somewhat discounted with no contract so they need to be on the network of whoever sold them.
By the way, and I'm not saying this to be mean or anything because I do enjoy reading your opinions here but... do you live here? I almost always see your comments as FP (or first +0 or better comment) or damn near it.
But then you have the problem of the buttons digging into the screen and permanently scuffing them. I have had a few flip phones which ended up getting exact copies of the direction pad and number buttons scratched into the screen. I've also had a couple laptops which suffered from that, too.. designers trying to get as close as possible without physically touching while the device is at rest end up having things touch when the item is in a pants pocket or laptop bag.
I'm actually going to see if I can pick up another copy of it, I haven't read it in years and couldn't remember the title until you provoked me to search for it.
I expect the typical Slashdick comments about how that book is so-and-so and how I'm an ass will roll in but I like it enough to buy it and re-read it.
That would be nice but it's just easier for them to tell people who want/need ports opened that they are out of luck. I went through DNSMadeEasy.com (don't work for them) and they host my DNS and SMTP server. I think it costs me about $25 a year. I was using www.granitecanyon.com's free DNS but I was getting what I paid for because it was up and down almost at a whim... good when it ran because it was free but paying a little bit for DNS services now means I have full record editing but it's easy to do so if/when I need to.
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The only thing it has going for it is the push email. My MS Smartphone receives email but only when it connects and checks my mailbox. Maybe if I had an important email that was received 1 minute after it just checked, I'd have to wait 29 more minutes to have it automatically check again. If my almost half-hour were THAT important to me, I would consider a BB.
You're right though.. they SUCK as a PDA but that's because they aren't supposed to be PDAs. It's an email terminal and nothing else. The user interface is complete crap, the scroll wheel is impossible to get used to. The only thing it does well is make and receive calls and email push.
I don't know if it's in the final design but I believe there is supposed to be a radio inside that functions with others as a grid/repeater.
I would put up with the noise this thing generates (I'm 29 but my hearing is still well above average) to walk in to a 7-11, buy my stuff and leave without having to worry about the intentions (if any) of the people hanging around out front.
Back to the subject of the Xbox. It's normal and expected to have a small number of defective machines - that's why they have a warranty. With the CPU, GPU, RAM for both, ROM for the OS, all of the various logic chips and the power supply involved - I'm surprised that anything that complex works at all half the time.
The bios on the motherboard that the CPU is packaged with presumably reports the fake speed. I would assume that is why it's sold in a combo.
No kidding... I never thought I could burn a cd on my PC. I also never thought I could justify a $1000 DVD burner. How is this any more unreasonable than that?
http://www.xk72.com/midpssh/
MidpSSH is an integrated telnet/SSH client with lots of display options, a phonebook (!!) and seems to be very stable. I'm only having one problem though - I can telnet fine, I can SSH to my Smoothwall firewall but I can't SSH to my OSX box... Granted it's only been 10 minutes of fiddling so far so I may be overlooking something.
Only problem with it so far is that the vibrator in my phone goes off when I move the direction pad.. very odd to say the least.
PS: http://www.xk72.com/midpssh/
Those numbers are pretty ugly when you think about it. Two out of 12 people give a damn enough to buy a brand new TV and one of those two bothered to buy the component cable. By the way, the one who bought the HD cable also sold his HDTV because he just doesn't watch TV enough to justify a gigantic TV in his condo.
I don't think that HDTV/console gaming is at a big enough saturation to compel Nintendo to include HDTV support. They make money hand over fist so I'm sure they believe this is the best way to market the machine but I can only guess that adding HDTV support and just selling the cable seperately would only tack on an extra $10-15 bucks.
The delicious irony in that is that titles like, "Healthy in Paranoid Times," "Get Right With the Man," "Nothing is Sound," "The Invisible Invasion," "Phantoms," "Life in Agony," and "Suspicious Activity" all install the rootkit and compromise your computer.
TMM: I'm sorry, come back and post!
Wouldn't it be more "legal" if it said something like, "I believe Jack Thompson is a self-aggrandizing asshole?"
Give a man a fish and you feed him for a day.
Teach a man to fish and you give up your monopoly on fisheries.
Same thing when I record a copy of Amazing race or download the first episode because my in-laws missed it. I'll admit that they are losing revenue on the movie by us not trekking to the local googolplex but we probably wouldn't go anyway. My opinion of P2P is that I get a lower-quality product for free and if I really want to get the super-high-def experience, I'll pull my wallet out and cough up the bucks.
Well then, that explains everything!
I went around and around to get a phone repaired through Motorola. They sent me an ATTWS branded phone that wouldn't work with my ATTWS SIM card. First reaction I had was to call ATTWS, they told me they don't have the unlock codes and I need to call Motorola. Calling Motorola gave me the same runaround, THEY don't have the codes, ATTWS does! I finally spoke to someone in the Consumer Advocacy group in Moto and they gave me the unlock code in about 5 minutes. I'm sure ATTWS had the codes but that would kill their business model if they allowed someone to put another SIM card in!
PS: It was a quad-band "World" phone which meant I could use it anywhere in the "world" with ATTWS's SIM and international roaming rates. Not that I did but if I wanted to use it with a prepaid SIM in Europe, I couldn't - even if I was still paying ATTWS each month under contract.
By the way, and I'm not saying this to be mean or anything because I do enjoy reading your opinions here but... do you live here? I almost always see your comments as FP (or first +0 or better comment) or damn near it.
But then you have the problem of the buttons digging into the screen and permanently scuffing them. I have had a few flip phones which ended up getting exact copies of the direction pad and number buttons scratched into the screen. I've also had a couple laptops which suffered from that, too.. designers trying to get as close as possible without physically touching while the device is at rest end up having things touch when the item is in a pants pocket or laptop bag.
Incidentally, your /. journal entries don't have any better content than 99% of the journals from LJ.
But it put Ogdenville, North Haverbrook, and Brockway on the map!
Thank you.
Pat Frank's Alas, Babylon is a great read.
http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/tg/detail/-/0060 931396/qid=/sr=/ref=cm_lm_asin/104-9468939-5727960 ?v=glance&s=books
I'm actually going to see if I can pick up another copy of it, I haven't read it in years and couldn't remember the title until you provoked me to search for it.
I expect the typical Slashdick comments about how that book is so-and-so and how I'm an ass will roll in but I like it enough to buy it and re-read it.
You live in the USA?
That would be nice but it's just easier for them to tell people who want/need ports opened that they are out of luck. I went through DNSMadeEasy.com (don't work for them) and they host my DNS and SMTP server. I think it costs me about $25 a year. I was using www.granitecanyon.com's free DNS but I was getting what I paid for because it was up and down almost at a whim... good when it ran because it was free but paying a little bit for DNS services now means I have full record editing but it's easy to do so if/when I need to.
Ok, they have 4 billion dollars, where the fuck is the Mac version?