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User: symbolset

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  1. Re:Ting on WSJ: Americans' Phone Bills Are Going Up · · Score: 3, Informative

    You can configure your Nexus 5, and specific apps and services on it, to not use mobile data in the background. In Settings -> Data Usage scroll down and you will see apps. Select the app, scroll down again and you will see the setting "restrict background data". Check this box and it will stop using mobile data while the app is in the background. This is especially critical for things like Google+, where if you take one HD video it will try to sync it in the background and kill your monthly quota. My kids were making videos with my phone while I slept...

    Ting looks like a nice deal, and enthusiastic support. I was very frustrated dealing with Sprint to acquire a SIM for my Nexus 5. They were abhorrent in person at three stores and in online chat as well. That kind of put me off. I did finally manage to get SIMs from Ting real easy like. But the experience put me off even of using Sprint towers.

    Besides, T-mobile has been really nice to me. That's worth a few extra bucks.

    Stay away from Microsoft Skype on your Nexus 5. It has a known issue that kills the battery. Imagine that.

  2. Re:I, for one, do welcome that test on New Blood Test Offers Early Warning for Alzheimer's Onset · · Score: 1

    I feel for you. You should see what it's like having to reject the mobile version horror all day. If you liked this article you should read that one about the new blood test that can predict Alzheimer's.

  3. Re:Given Microsoft's past history on Google Blocking Asus's Android-Windows "Duet"? · · Score: 0

    Apparently if you are foolish enough to run Microsoft's Skype on your Nexus 5, they have found a way to kill your battery. This is the same old Microsoft we have always known.

  4. Re:The mobile war is over, Andorid has won on Firefox OS Will Become the Mobile OS To Beat · · Score: 1

    Really I know it's shocking, but one billion smart phones were actually sold last year.

  5. Re: The mobile war is over, Andorid has won on Firefox OS Will Become the Mobile OS To Beat · · Score: 1

    The desktop was once everything there was, and Microsoft's control of it mattered. Now it is one fifth of everything, and Microsoft's control of it doesn't matter any more. Servers have to support these new things that cannot run IE, AD, Outlook and Office because they outnumber PCs 4:1. Corporate cannot ignore 80% of the world. Developers are suddenly aware of cross platform needs. OEMs just cannot afford to keep ignoring this Android/Linux, ChromeOS/Linux demand. And so even on the desktop with 80% share Microsoft has lost the ability to set the pace and path of progress, to keep developers, OEMs, retailers, and VARs in line. They have lost control.

  6. Re: The mobile war is over, Andorid has won on Firefox OS Will Become the Mobile OS To Beat · · Score: 1

    We are here talking about Android/Linux outselling Windows last year by 4x, and what a challenge that is to FirefoxOS/Linux. Congratulations on finding the exact wrongest possible place to put your Windows desktop 4EVAR ad.

  7. Re:The mobile war is over, Andorid has won on Firefox OS Will Become the Mobile OS To Beat · · Score: 1

    By one billion he means per year. This year will be more of course. I think Firefox has some interesting potential, but agree with him that the incredibly high volumes of the low end of the Android device market make for amazing economies of scale. Getting under what components Android can run on may offer less scale and so no net savings at all.

  8. Re:Cramming a data plan onto a voice SIM on Firefox OS Will Become the Mobile OS To Beat · · Score: 1

    Sprint was a bitch about selling me a SIM for my Nexus 5s for prepaid. Offered to give it for postpaid, refused for prepaid claiming it might hurt my phone. This at their corporate store AND online chat. I had to buy Sprint SIMs from Ting. At this point I am so frustrated with the treatment that I don't think it's worth dealing with their dicky customer support to follow through with service. Plus, T-mo just doubled my 4G data for no extra fee. Ting is looking like a fun company with enthusiastic support if you need Sprint's 4G network though.

  9. Re:Why not open source it? on Microsoft Confirms DirectX 12 Is Alive and Well, Demo Coming At GDC · · Score: 4, Insightful

    The purpose of the existence of DirectX is to prevent cross-platform solutions.

  10. Re:Article not quite right on First LSD Test In 40 Years Reveal Drug Helps Terminal Patients Prepare For Death · · Score: 3, Funny

    Dude, that is the part of the story you are supposed to fill with your imagination.

  11. MPAA lawyer runs US Solicitor General on Feds Now Oppose Aereo, Rejecting Cloud Apocalypse Argument · · Score: 2

    The story is that the US Solicitor General (whose office prepared this brief) is a former top lawyer for the MPAA.

    "You will never find a more wretched hive of scum and villainy. We must be cautious." Obi-Wan Kenobi

  12. Re:welcome to the big time on F-Secure: Android Accounted For 97% of All Mobile Malware In 2013 · · Score: 3, Interesting

    It is not possible to check every application to see if it is harmless or not. Nobody has those kinds of resources.

    You do know we're talking about Google, right? Why would Google not have those kinds of resources? They scan the Internet every day, upload an hour of video every second, filter spam for hundreds of millions - better than anybody, and they made Android so they have the inside track on detecting undesirable code.

    I think it is 100% accurate to say Android is insecure by design in much the same way DOS era Windows file sharing is 100% insecure by design.

    These two things are unrelated. Now you seem to be saying you're complaining about Android security because others complain about the security of your preferred system. That is not relevant. Also, it's a confession that your argument lacks merit. Maybe not the direction you wanted to go.

    Android is intended for a mass market audience of people who know nothing about computers or software threats... Knowing this the designers decided the only access controls would be take it or leave it DEMANDS made by APPLICATIONS. This is why Android is insecure by design... it totally and utterly fails to protect the USER in the most basic rudimentary way possible.

    Now we are talking about a totally different thing - apps which require excessive permissions. As in, the end user gets to decide how much access he is willing to give each application. This is not malware at all and off topic for the discussion, but let's cover it. This is restraining applications that want to be more than the end user wants them to be, giving the end user full disclosure when an update seeks to do things it didn't do before. You make it sound like a bad thing, when in fact it's an enhancement above the other methods of application security provided by the system that empowers the user to be more restrictive than any algorithm could appropriately be. You make it sound like a bad thing. It's not.

  13. Re:welcome to the big time on F-Secure: Android Accounted For 97% of All Mobile Malware In 2013 · · Score: 4, Insightful

    If you can make a computer so simple even an idiot can use it, only an idiot will want to. I like Android's balance with Google play here. Stick with Google Play and you are good to go. Want to adventure? Enable side loading and have at it. Your choice. The complainers appear to be the sort who disable the safety features and then harm themselves, and blame Google for their own screwup.

  14. Re:welcome to the big time on F-Secure: Android Accounted For 97% of All Mobile Malware In 2013 · · Score: 1

    If someone chooses to run apps from every random stranger on the Internet then theyshould not be surprised that some of those apps do things they didn't want them to do. That shouldn't even be called a Trojan - it needs it own name. 'Tardware is too insensitive. Maybe "surpriseware" or "Programmer's choice app". It seems the people who complain the most about Android security are the most "special".

  15. Re:welcome to the big time on F-Secure: Android Accounted For 97% of All Mobile Malware In 2013 · · Score: 1

    This is why I wanted to see the story posted. There is no significant risk as long as you use a trustworthy app store. I knew there were people to come to complain that Linux/Android was insecure and they needed a good correcting. Thanks.

  16. Re:Slightly biased... on Android Beats iOS As the Top Tablet OS · · Score: 1

    The Nexus 10 has a really nice display. I wish they would release the new model with the better CPU soon though.

  17. Re:So what? on Android Beats iOS As the Top Tablet OS · · Score: 1

    Some vietnamese dude was making $50K a day on some stupid 2-days of code app called "flappy bird".

  18. Re:The year of the Linux Tablet on Android Beats iOS As the Top Tablet OS · · Score: 1

    I've got one that I use exclusively as a Chromecast remote. It was only $40, so why not?

  19. Re:The year of the Linux Tablet on Android Beats iOS As the Top Tablet OS · · Score: 1

    That doesn't seem to be happening with iPhone, which is considerably further down this curve. Instead it is quite efficiently skimming the cream off the top.

  20. Re:Trollbait article on Android Beats iOS As the Top Tablet OS · · Score: 1

    If Surface Pro was selling in significant numbers do you think the Seahawks defense could stand between Steve Ballmer and the TV cameras? I don't.

  21. Re:I Don't See How on India Plans Mission To Probe Sun By 2020 · · Score: 1

    India has more than enough trees and land and labor to build homes and sewers for everyone. They could. They just don't. Probably for the same reason the US has far vacant more homes than homeless people.

  22. Re:Mission to feed poor.. on India Plans Mission To Probe Sun By 2020 · · Score: 1

    The War on poverty was the first of many hopeless wars on abstractions. It was proposed by Lyndon Johnson at his inaugural in 1964.

  23. Starships on X-rays From Other Galaxies Could Emanate From Particles of Dark Matter · · Score: 3, Funny

    That is pollution left by the warp drives. The k'Thref effect causes small portions of neutrinos to go irrational.

  24. Re:Wait for better robots on How To Take Apart Fukushima's 3 Melted-Down Reactors · · Score: 1

    Your math is interesting. You assume one liter. Why?

  25. Teachers are products of this system on U.S. Students/Grads Carrying Over $1 Trillion In Debt · · Score: 1

    They start programming children to go into the system beginning in kindergarten. It is a self-reinforcing system.