It was a response to the above poster. See, Slashdot uses things called threads and you can see who I am responding to by clicking on the above message. I was quite clearly pointing out a feature that is not readily available in Android, thus not making it just "Android's features from a year ago." Learn to read.
Ye olde tyme fragmentation argument. News flash nerd^H^H^H^H programmer: Nobody but nerds like us give a rat's ass which version of Android they are using. My girlfriend has an Epic 4G running Froyo. She could give a shit less about that. It does what she wants. And what she doesn't want is to wake up to a surprise update that makes the icons look different and moves shit around. Get a fucking clue, dumbass. The fragmentation "issue" is something haters such as yourself made up in a pathetic attempt to slag on Android. It falls completely flat in the real world though as there is very little material difference between Android 2.1/2.2/2.3 which is over 90 percent of Android users. And the people on older versions probably like it as it's what they are used to. Duh.
Ah, ye olde stupidity argument. Because the user is stupid, they don't deserve or want anything better. Just because your girlfriend must be stupid (after all, she's going out with you) and you expect updates to destroy the system (clearly, as the iPhone has changed so dramatically from version 1 to 5...), does not mean that the people at Google, HTC, Samsung, Motorola, etc are not capable of providing non-breaking updates. You're right though: it's actually a feature that she has not yet been updated to 2.3. That's some of the most impressively stupid logic that I have seen from a true Android fanboy in awhile.
I guess it was just accidental that you ignored the point about Android 2.3 introducing a good copy/paste system. I'm sure you also conveniently ignore that as you almost certainly attacked WP7 for lacking it (I was going to find a post, but there were just too many troll posts written by you to find one from that far back). On WP7, it was lacking the universal feature. On your girlfriend's Android running 2.2, I'm sure you discount the lack of a good copy/paste system as just a convenience she doesn't want. The non-upgrade feature really is beautiful. I like it the more I think I about it... wow.
Yeah, now I know you're a troll. The SMS bug was the most sensationalized overblown tempest in a teapot I've ever seen.
Overblown or not, if it happened to you on the wrong text message, then not only could it simply be awkward, but it could be downright problematic. Who hasn't sent an insulting message to a friend about another person? No one. Now, what happens when that text goes to that person or a friend of them. Now what if it's your boss. Great system. Let's ignore it because it's not widespread. Sure, it prevents the phone from working as a phone, but that's no big deal. It's Android!! Woo...?
Oh, that's right. I forgot about the iPhone alarm clock problems. Hope your hours are "flexible".
Unlike you, I won't deny the iPhone bug. Fortunately for me, the bug only affected the US on days that have not been workdays. I'm even willing to leave the iPhone ecosystem for a new system, and I'll also be willing to leave the WP7 ecosystem should something be better. A system with a no-upgrade feature does not match my tastes currently.
Enjoy your iphone, faggot. And when you get whatever boring piece of shit monochrome wannabe widget having ass wp7 phone, enjoy sticking it up your ass too, 'tard.
Ah, uninformed fanboys. I'm curious which version of Android provides the best--by far--integration of multiple discussion formats (IM, Facebook, text, email, twitter) into one cognitive and readable (something most Android skins don't seem to care about) feed that can also be split off into groups.
Like many of you, as a programmer I have a bunch of technical friends, and I frequently see my friends walking around toting their Android phones. For starters, none of them have the same version of Android. Some of them face that nostalgia inducing SMS bug, where texts are sent to the wrong person. Now, that's love. Thankfully, at least my roommate finally got 2.3 on his Android in June of this year; no big deal, it only came out in December, 2010.
Now he can join the rest of us and actually use his phone. I'm so glad I never bought into the fragmented, may-never-be-updated hype machine. Though, unlike most people I don't really care who makes my phone. I just want the best one. Right now, it's absolutely not an Android phone because you simply never know what you'll get unless you're willing to sit around and futz with it all day, which I simply do not have time to do. Maybe Android 3.1/4.0 will fix that? Of course, it's going to be hard to root onto your phone if they never follow the GPL and release the source code...
How many people even realize that copy and paste is terrible until Android 2.3? Probably not many, as--chances are--you probably don't even have 2.3 (note: stats from June, so 2.3 will probably be about 5% higher this month, but still dramatically lower than 2.2) unless you rooted it onto your device yourself, or upgraded by purchasing a new phone (sweet system). I remember it being great fun to make fun of WP7 not having it until May, even though the majority of Android users can't even use it standardly across the entire system today. I guess when I dump my iPhone for a Windows Phone this Fall, the joke will be on me and my, at least short term, guaranteed upgrade path?
That's the entire point. They want to A) say that Android isn't free, nor is it as profitable as a result. And B) show that for a similar licensing fee or less, you can (as a company) quit forcing your customers into a no-win upgrade cycle that Apple has gotten out of doing. Microsoft is almost certainly asking for $15 while aiming to be haggled down to around $10 with a stronger partnership negotiated for WP7, which follows Apple's one-year (or maybe they'll go to semi-annual) upgrade path. To be frank, Samsung's first offerings caused the majority of the problems for the WP7 upgrades due to buggy firmwares, so it's in Microsoft's interest to strong arm them into making better WP7 phones.
In Apple and Microsoft's perspective, this can enable phone manufacturers to gain higher profits by minimizing the number of handsets that they must make (the rat race that currently exists where they must one-up everyone else, including themselves about every quarter) as well create a more standard base, allowing each manufacturer (e.g., HTC versus Nokia versus Samsung) to become really good at something to be the reason to buy it (e.g., Nokia has the best cameras in phones, HTC throws the biggest screens in phones and Samsung has some of the most attractive screens with AMOLED).
To throw some reality into the mix, who hasn't questioned a purchase because of the rumored next release? My office mate recently bought the HTC Thunderbolt after literally half a year of bouncing between the latest Android handsets coming out. Sure, that's just one guy, but I know I've been in a similar boat and I'm sure most other people have too. More predictable release cycles benefit consumers and manufacturers with people like him and I, because we are much more likely to purchase something rather than wait, when there is a reasonable assurance that the next best phone being released won't be for awhile.
It's obviously win-win for Microsoft, but I actually think there is some advantage in the Apple approach for a business on that scale.
It's a fair comment, except for two things in my particular case:
1. You're still killing time by fast forwarding through the commercials, which takes almost as long as Hulu commercial breaks. 2. I would have to buy something that I do not have. For starters I do not have cable or satellite TV, and second, I don't feel like paying for TiVo, renting a DVR, or configuring my own computer to do it all for me, which would probably be even more expensive.
The fact is you're a liar, and you are going out of your way for some reason to attack one company, while leaving the other in a much better position than it deserves. You hypocritically ignored the fact that you made up Google's 100% uptime. Google doesn't even claim the figure in the article you linked and they offer similar promises.
It's also worth noting--to you especially--that offering a discount due to downtime is not the same as guaranteeing downtime. Financially compensating for that downtime is what is called out, in clear terms. That's pretty much the entire premise of the Google article, which spends the top half congratulating them on an originally far worse policy of ignoring downtime less than 10 minutes.
Keep on ignorantly enjoying your "100%" uptime on your Google Cloud. I'll be enjoying the show from the sidelines.
That's a hard statement to disagree with. However, you can still show plenty of stupid failures. Even coming from NASA.
I doubt you've forgotten the problem with going from NASA's $330 million "metric mixup."
However, even with that, I agree with GaryOlson (the other poster) and that's why I like the labs and also NASA. Even from mistakes come lessons learned. Some are just a wee-bit expensive that shouldn't have been necessary.
Yes, it was left up to the reader to find the second worst possible scenario. The only thing worse would be anything less than 94.99%, which would mean that you get the entire service for free.
Why not mention 365 possible days of downtime, or even 19 days per year? After all, it's just as possible as 18 days per year for 50% off.
Not only was the summary intentionally misleading, but it was a downright lie when he mentioned Google's "100%" claim that I took at face value. The Google article never even mentions 100% uptime.
GMail is quoted in the article for 2010 having a 99.984% uptime.
I love NASA. But to suggest that one good example, even when it itself is riddled with bad examples somehow means that the rest of the government runs like clockwork is both naive and, frankly, stupid.
There are plenty of other good examples, like the various national labs, which I would actually put above NASA in many ways. Still, ignoring the rest of the government and our almost unimaginable scale of overspending with a history of missing deadlines and budgets is over the top. Even for Slashdot.
You do not sound like an incompetent bureaucrat that wants to turn around and blame the contractor if anything goes wrong, all-the-while both changing and adding requirements throughout the project.
With that said, I would hope that SAIC could have bought a company that already makes time management software on the desired scale for a fraction of the current cost. Maybe even for a portion of the original $63 million estimate.
I am not sure what is so special about a city that they need their own unique time management system. It's not like there aren't a bajillion in existence already ranging from overly simple to extremely complex. While I'm sure they need the extremely complex region, it really should have been handed to a company with experience in the arena already to either purchase an existing product, or add required features to one.
There I go thinking about someone outside of the government. I'll move along now.
The 18 days comes from the product of 1.5 days/month * 12 months.
I think it's a bit high regardless (1.5 days could easily fall on a weekend that I might need or even want to work), but it's misleading (at best) to suggest it's 18 days of straight offline time.
Even worse, no where in the article does it actually state 1.5 days. Anywhere. I must be new here, but here is the relevant quote from the article:
Under the service level agreement, customers receive 25 per cent off their monthly payment if uptime falls below 99.9 per cent to 99 per cent, half of the sum back if it falls below 99 per cent and a complete refund for anything under 95 per cent.
King said clearly Microsoft would prefer it had no issues but claimed: "the processes in place are robust and financially backed, if you look across cloud providers in the market that is unique."
In other words, it's just like Google's service, only they don't claim 100% uptime, which is unlikely to be realistic (even Gmail has failed on numerous occasions). And, they pay you if it falls below 99.9% uptime. Considering that you still get the benefit of local deployment, as well as the cloud, I'd say that's actually a good deal.
Not one I have any interest in paying for, but it sounds a lot better than Google's unlikely claim.
Either that, or it's because he accepted money and other "lavish" gifts that collegiate athletes everywhere would want, but do not take because they follow the rules.
On one hand, I can understand the players' reasoning. The players' are the reason that these schools make tons of money off of their athletic programs, but, on the other hand, the rules are there for a reason. Either play by them, or do not play at all.
At the same time, I do not understand how someone can be told to pay back "gifts." I cannot really find anywhere that says he accepted more than just gifts (rather than outright cash). That sounds an awful lot like the non-PC named "Indian Giving" by the agent that should be banned from helping college athletes.
I know that you recognize it, as do most people on Slashdot, but services are clearly making their way onto the internet. I watch Hulu for all of my current TV needs, and the fact that their ads are so short (usually two per ad-block, and about a minute for the block), I usually actually pay attention to them because I don't have to kill time to go do something else as I do with traditional TV commercials, which take up literally a third of the show.
For that reason alone, they should be higher value than normal commercials with the caveat that less people (currently) are watching them.
You know, I really like Hulu, but one thing that the cable companies seem to ignore is the ability for people to simply not watch TV.
I am in the growing minority of people that actually do not have a TV service (cable nor satellite) because I find comfort in paying about $10 and getting Netflix while paying nothing and getting a lot of ad-supported content on Hulu.
I do not pirate whatsoever, so I literally only use those services to watch video on demand (although I do buy the occasional DVD and TV series, albeit quite rarely).
These media companies can get me with the ads. Hulu usually even has pretty high quality ones, even if there are two of them where there used to be one. I can live with that. However, I will not pay to have that experience. They did not earn any reason to allow them to double dip.
Now, I wonder how long before this minority starts to grow into such a size that it actually stands out to them. Because the days of charging a monthly, randomly growing amount of money to sell a couple of hundred channels when the person only wants maybe 10 and most of the time it is garbage anyway (how many times do people go channel surfing to try and find something?). I honestly hope that more people start doing what I am doing to force those businesses to start lowering their prices to bring people back.
After all, if they charged consistent, reasonable rates, then this post probably wouldn't even exist. I can afford their plans. I, like many people, just don't feel like the value justifies the cost.
I hope that happens. Helping someone like this during an armed hostage taking should cause you to get charged with aiding and abetting. Not to mention the slew of other conspiracy charges that you brought up.
After all, the assistance put the woman's life in danger. What if he flipped out because of it and killed or otherwise hurt her? It absolutely put the SWAT officer's life in danger. Not to mention it probably served to elongate the whole ordeal.
You don't get to fire warning shorts toward someone and say it's something other than firing at them. To be a warning shot, it must have been shot in their direction. The danger with shooting a gun, in any direction, in a motel really shouldn't need to be explained to anyone.
The only nation you mentioned that is of a real worry--militarily--is possibly the Russian Federation.
As far as Iran goes, that is all-the-more reason to ensure that they do not get nuclear weapons, which as the world stands by and listens to one--of the top two--craziest national leaders exclaim that they have no intentions to get nuclear weapons, seems more and more likely to go unimpeded. Oh, and they have have no gay people in Iran either. But they'd love to blow Israel and the US off the face of the Earth. Totally unrelated, I'm sure.
As for Saudi Arabia having nukes: where would they get them? Russia? If Russia won't sell them to Iran alongside everything else, then why would they sell it to Saudi Arabia? Granted, it's a very realistic fear to have, but given the turmoil that already originates from there while they have money, I am far less concerned about them with less money. The article notes the possibly that China might have done so at least 20 years ago, but it also notes the promise that no nuclear tips would be used (not so much going on their word, but a more fearful and less powerful Chinese government probably would not want to be caught selling nuclear missiles; they didn't even give them to North Korea after all--the US effectively did thanks to Jimmy Carter's wonderful negotiating...).
It's also all-the-more reason to continue the missile shield program. No longer being afraid of a bunch of crazed nations with or without money sounds awfully appealing to me.
This implies that simply because the regulator makes more than he could if he worked within the industry, then he could not be bribed.
Why not? Tons of unethical people make it to the top, only to decide that they want even more money.
The worst case scenario should be that they go to jail. As does the briber (those responsible, and not the entire company as one rotten apple does not necessarily have to poison the tree).
As for the solution to the problem? Start sticking to requirements and guidelines. Exceptions must be made publicly on the regulatory body's website (for anyone that cares) and a press release must be sent. If what you're doing sounds too scary for that to be desirable (I doubt the public hearing that "acceptable leakage was too conservative" is too appealing), then you probably shouldn't be greasing the wheel. On the other hand, if it truly is too strict of a requirement or guideline, then it should be changed _with_ the public outrage.
avoid energy prices... that... depend on... the Middle East
Agreed. This is my favorite reason for finding an alternative fuel. It will ease a lot of economic burdens, except in the Middle East, and stop giving hundreds of billions of dollars to dictators, and other people that care nothing about their people.
In the best case scenario, the OS keeps track of requests for location by apps and guarantees that the first request is always preempted by a user dialog. In an almost worst case scenario, the OS depends on static analysis and misses dynamic calls (reflection where available) and side loaded applications that are filled with trojan functionality. In the worst case scenario, the OS maker buries the consent in the Terms of Service.
I believe that every application on iOS already faces the best case, but it may be through static code analysis.
I think that Android does static analysis and I know that it mentions it in the installer, but I'm not sure how they figure it out other than static analysis (maybe a config file like WP7).
WP7 requires a flag be set by the application at a configuration level to have access. If it is flagged, then the request is made to the user. Without the flag, the application cannot request location details.
Regardless, I feel like this is just another thing that really is not necessary for a law to be in place about. Especially not in the manner that it is phrased. That just begs for a single line in the ToS.
For really going after what is a problem in our country.
Not the job market. Not the national debt. Not the continued housing crisis. Not any of the three wars we are actively participating in (Libya, Iraq (yes, still), and Afghanistan). Not healthcare. Not the tax system.
Nope, it's little kids or adults showing their support for artists by lip syncing. We really have to protect those artists from such stealing! Those poor, underpaid artists (and their leeches that lobby for them, AKA the RIAA).
Slashdot Mirror
It was a response to the above poster. See, Slashdot uses things called threads and you can see who I am responding to by clicking on the above message. I was quite clearly pointing out a feature that is not readily available in Android, thus not making it just "Android's features from a year ago." Learn to read.
Ah, ye olde stupidity argument. Because the user is stupid, they don't deserve or want anything better. Just because your girlfriend must be stupid (after all, she's going out with you) and you expect updates to destroy the system (clearly, as the iPhone has changed so dramatically from version 1 to 5...), does not mean that the people at Google, HTC, Samsung, Motorola, etc are not capable of providing non-breaking updates. You're right though: it's actually a feature that she has not yet been updated to 2.3. That's some of the most impressively stupid logic that I have seen from a true Android fanboy in awhile.
I guess it was just accidental that you ignored the point about Android 2.3 introducing a good copy/paste system. I'm sure you also conveniently ignore that as you almost certainly attacked WP7 for lacking it (I was going to find a post, but there were just too many troll posts written by you to find one from that far back). On WP7, it was lacking the universal feature. On your girlfriend's Android running 2.2, I'm sure you discount the lack of a good copy/paste system as just a convenience she doesn't want. The non-upgrade feature really is beautiful. I like it the more I think I about it... wow.
Overblown or not, if it happened to you on the wrong text message, then not only could it simply be awkward, but it could be downright problematic. Who hasn't sent an insulting message to a friend about another person? No one. Now, what happens when that text goes to that person or a friend of them. Now what if it's your boss. Great system. Let's ignore it because it's not widespread. Sure, it prevents the phone from working as a phone, but that's no big deal. It's Android!! Woo...?
Unlike you, I won't deny the iPhone bug. Fortunately for me, the bug only affected the US on days that have not been workdays. I'm even willing to leave the iPhone ecosystem for a new system, and I'll also be willing to leave the WP7 ecosystem should something be better. A system with a no-upgrade feature does not match my tastes currently.
Your clearest argument.
Ah, uninformed fanboys. I'm curious which version of Android provides the best--by far--integration of multiple discussion formats (IM, Facebook, text, email, twitter) into one cognitive and readable (something most Android skins don't seem to care about) feed that can also be split off into groups.
Like many of you, as a programmer I have a bunch of technical friends, and I frequently see my friends walking around toting their Android phones. For starters, none of them have the same version of Android. Some of them face that nostalgia inducing SMS bug, where texts are sent to the wrong person. Now, that's love. Thankfully, at least my roommate finally got 2.3 on his Android in June of this year; no big deal, it only came out in December, 2010.
Now he can join the rest of us and actually use his phone. I'm so glad I never bought into the fragmented, may-never-be-updated hype machine. Though, unlike most people I don't really care who makes my phone. I just want the best one. Right now, it's absolutely not an Android phone because you simply never know what you'll get unless you're willing to sit around and futz with it all day, which I simply do not have time to do. Maybe Android 3.1/4.0 will fix that? Of course, it's going to be hard to root onto your phone if they never follow the GPL and release the source code...
How many people even realize that copy and paste is terrible until Android 2.3? Probably not many, as--chances are--you probably don't even have 2.3 (note: stats from June, so 2.3 will probably be about 5% higher this month, but still dramatically lower than 2.2) unless you rooted it onto your device yourself, or upgraded by purchasing a new phone (sweet system). I remember it being great fun to make fun of WP7 not having it until May, even though the majority of Android users can't even use it standardly across the entire system today. I guess when I dump my iPhone for a Windows Phone this Fall, the joke will be on me and my, at least short term, guaranteed upgrade path?
That's fine. Microsoft doesn't even mind that. On the other hand, Windows Phone has nothing to do with Windows Mobile. It's a complete rewrite.
I thought this was a tech site? I must be new here...
Spoken like a true person that has never used one, and someone who definitely has never used a WP7 running the upcoming Mango release.
That's the entire point. They want to A) say that Android isn't free, nor is it as profitable as a result. And B) show that for a similar licensing fee or less, you can (as a company) quit forcing your customers into a no-win upgrade cycle that Apple has gotten out of doing. Microsoft is almost certainly asking for $15 while aiming to be haggled down to around $10 with a stronger partnership negotiated for WP7, which follows Apple's one-year (or maybe they'll go to semi-annual) upgrade path. To be frank, Samsung's first offerings caused the majority of the problems for the WP7 upgrades due to buggy firmwares, so it's in Microsoft's interest to strong arm them into making better WP7 phones.
In Apple and Microsoft's perspective, this can enable phone manufacturers to gain higher profits by minimizing the number of handsets that they must make (the rat race that currently exists where they must one-up everyone else, including themselves about every quarter) as well create a more standard base, allowing each manufacturer (e.g., HTC versus Nokia versus Samsung) to become really good at something to be the reason to buy it (e.g., Nokia has the best cameras in phones, HTC throws the biggest screens in phones and Samsung has some of the most attractive screens with AMOLED).
To throw some reality into the mix, who hasn't questioned a purchase because of the rumored next release? My office mate recently bought the HTC Thunderbolt after literally half a year of bouncing between the latest Android handsets coming out. Sure, that's just one guy, but I know I've been in a similar boat and I'm sure most other people have too. More predictable release cycles benefit consumers and manufacturers with people like him and I, because we are much more likely to purchase something rather than wait, when there is a reasonable assurance that the next best phone being released won't be for awhile.
It's obviously win-win for Microsoft, but I actually think there is some advantage in the Apple approach for a business on that scale.
Except it's not even remotely new. Stock market bubbles have come and gone on a scarily common cycle.
How these idiots keep doing it is beyond me.
It's a fair comment, except for two things in my particular case:
1. You're still killing time by fast forwarding through the commercials, which takes almost as long as Hulu commercial breaks.
2. I would have to buy something that I do not have. For starters I do not have cable or satellite TV, and second, I don't feel like paying for TiVo, renting a DVR, or configuring my own computer to do it all for me, which would probably be even more expensive.
The fact is you're a liar, and you are going out of your way for some reason to attack one company, while leaving the other in a much better position than it deserves. You hypocritically ignored the fact that you made up Google's 100% uptime. Google doesn't even claim the figure in the article you linked and they offer similar promises.
It's also worth noting--to you especially--that offering a discount due to downtime is not the same as guaranteeing downtime. Financially compensating for that downtime is what is called out, in clear terms. That's pretty much the entire premise of the Google article, which spends the top half congratulating them on an originally far worse policy of ignoring downtime less than 10 minutes.
Keep on ignorantly enjoying your "100%" uptime on your Google Cloud. I'll be enjoying the show from the sidelines.
That's a hard statement to disagree with. However, you can still show plenty of stupid failures. Even coming from NASA.
I doubt you've forgotten the problem with going from NASA's $330 million "metric mixup."
However, even with that, I agree with GaryOlson (the other poster) and that's why I like the labs and also NASA. Even from mistakes come lessons learned. Some are just a wee-bit expensive that shouldn't have been necessary.
Yes, it was left up to the reader to find the second worst possible scenario. The only thing worse would be anything less than 94.99%, which would mean that you get the entire service for free.
Why not mention 365 possible days of downtime, or even 19 days per year? After all, it's just as possible as 18 days per year for 50% off.
Not only was the summary intentionally misleading, but it was a downright lie when he mentioned Google's "100%" claim that I took at face value. The Google article never even mentions 100% uptime.
GMail is quoted in the article for 2010 having a 99.984% uptime.
Cherry pick much?
I love NASA. But to suggest that one good example, even when it itself is riddled with bad examples somehow means that the rest of the government runs like clockwork is both naive and, frankly, stupid.
There are plenty of other good examples, like the various national labs, which I would actually put above NASA in many ways. Still, ignoring the rest of the government and our almost unimaginable scale of overspending with a history of missing deadlines and budgets is over the top. Even for Slashdot.
You do not sound like an incompetent bureaucrat that wants to turn around and blame the contractor if anything goes wrong, all-the-while both changing and adding requirements throughout the project.
With that said, I would hope that SAIC could have bought a company that already makes time management software on the desired scale for a fraction of the current cost. Maybe even for a portion of the original $63 million estimate.
I am not sure what is so special about a city that they need their own unique time management system. It's not like there aren't a bajillion in existence already ranging from overly simple to extremely complex. While I'm sure they need the extremely complex region, it really should have been handed to a company with experience in the arena already to either purchase an existing product, or add required features to one.
There I go thinking about someone outside of the government. I'll move along now.
The 18 days comes from the product of 1.5 days/month * 12 months.
I think it's a bit high regardless (1.5 days could easily fall on a weekend that I might need or even want to work), but it's misleading (at best) to suggest it's 18 days of straight offline time.
Even worse, no where in the article does it actually state 1.5 days. Anywhere. I must be new here, but here is the relevant quote from the article:
In other words, it's just like Google's service, only they don't claim 100% uptime, which is unlikely to be realistic (even Gmail has failed on numerous occasions). And, they pay you if it falls below 99.9% uptime. Considering that you still get the benefit of local deployment, as well as the cloud, I'd say that's actually a good deal.
Not one I have any interest in paying for, but it sounds a lot better than Google's unlikely claim.
Either that, or it's because he accepted money and other "lavish" gifts that collegiate athletes everywhere would want, but do not take because they follow the rules.
On one hand, I can understand the players' reasoning. The players' are the reason that these schools make tons of money off of their athletic programs, but, on the other hand, the rules are there for a reason. Either play by them, or do not play at all.
At the same time, I do not understand how someone can be told to pay back "gifts." I cannot really find anywhere that says he accepted more than just gifts (rather than outright cash). That sounds an awful lot like the non-PC named "Indian Giving" by the agent that should be banned from helping college athletes.
That's only because they are stupid.
I know that you recognize it, as do most people on Slashdot, but services are clearly making their way onto the internet. I watch Hulu for all of my current TV needs, and the fact that their ads are so short (usually two per ad-block, and about a minute for the block), I usually actually pay attention to them because I don't have to kill time to go do something else as I do with traditional TV commercials, which take up literally a third of the show.
For that reason alone, they should be higher value than normal commercials with the caveat that less people (currently) are watching them.
You know, I really like Hulu, but one thing that the cable companies seem to ignore is the ability for people to simply not watch TV.
I am in the growing minority of people that actually do not have a TV service (cable nor satellite) because I find comfort in paying about $10 and getting Netflix while paying nothing and getting a lot of ad-supported content on Hulu.
I do not pirate whatsoever, so I literally only use those services to watch video on demand (although I do buy the occasional DVD and TV series, albeit quite rarely).
These media companies can get me with the ads. Hulu usually even has pretty high quality ones, even if there are two of them where there used to be one. I can live with that. However, I will not pay to have that experience. They did not earn any reason to allow them to double dip.
Now, I wonder how long before this minority starts to grow into such a size that it actually stands out to them. Because the days of charging a monthly, randomly growing amount of money to sell a couple of hundred channels when the person only wants maybe 10 and most of the time it is garbage anyway (how many times do people go channel surfing to try and find something?). I honestly hope that more people start doing what I am doing to force those businesses to start lowering their prices to bring people back.
After all, if they charged consistent, reasonable rates, then this post probably wouldn't even exist. I can afford their plans. I, like many people, just don't feel like the value justifies the cost.
I hope that happens. Helping someone like this during an armed hostage taking should cause you to get charged with aiding and abetting. Not to mention the slew of other conspiracy charges that you brought up.
After all, the assistance put the woman's life in danger. What if he flipped out because of it and killed or otherwise hurt her? It absolutely put the SWAT officer's life in danger. Not to mention it probably served to elongate the whole ordeal.
You don't get to fire warning shorts toward someone and say it's something other than firing at them. To be a warning shot, it must have been shot in their direction. The danger with shooting a gun, in any direction, in a motel really shouldn't need to be explained to anyone.
The only nation you mentioned that is of a real worry--militarily--is possibly the Russian Federation.
As far as Iran goes, that is all-the-more reason to ensure that they do not get nuclear weapons, which as the world stands by and listens to one--of the top two--craziest national leaders exclaim that they have no intentions to get nuclear weapons, seems more and more likely to go unimpeded. Oh, and they have have no gay people in Iran either. But they'd love to blow Israel and the US off the face of the Earth. Totally unrelated, I'm sure.
As for Saudi Arabia having nukes: where would they get them? Russia? If Russia won't sell them to Iran alongside everything else, then why would they sell it to Saudi Arabia? Granted, it's a very realistic fear to have, but given the turmoil that already originates from there while they have money, I am far less concerned about them with less money. The article notes the possibly that China might have done so at least 20 years ago, but it also notes the promise that no nuclear tips would be used (not so much going on their word, but a more fearful and less powerful Chinese government probably would not want to be caught selling nuclear missiles; they didn't even give them to North Korea after all--the US effectively did thanks to Jimmy Carter's wonderful negotiating...).
It's also all-the-more reason to continue the missile shield program. No longer being afraid of a bunch of crazed nations with or without money sounds awfully appealing to me.
This implies that simply because the regulator makes more than he could if he worked within the industry, then he could not be bribed.
Why not? Tons of unethical people make it to the top, only to decide that they want even more money.
The worst case scenario should be that they go to jail. As does the briber (those responsible, and not the entire company as one rotten apple does not necessarily have to poison the tree).
As for the solution to the problem? Start sticking to requirements and guidelines. Exceptions must be made publicly on the regulatory body's website (for anyone that cares) and a press release must be sent. If what you're doing sounds too scary for that to be desirable (I doubt the public hearing that "acceptable leakage was too conservative" is too appealing), then you probably shouldn't be greasing the wheel. On the other hand, if it truly is too strict of a requirement or guideline, then it should be changed _with_ the public outrage.
Agreed. This is my favorite reason for finding an alternative fuel. It will ease a lot of economic burdens, except in the Middle East, and stop giving hundreds of billions of dollars to dictators, and other people that care nothing about their people.
Not the ones that this bill is hoping to protect.
I don't believe that most Senators are smart enough to use Facebook. The rest, I do.
And there's something seriously unnerving about that.
In the best case scenario, the OS keeps track of requests for location by apps and guarantees that the first request is always preempted by a user dialog.
In an almost worst case scenario, the OS depends on static analysis and misses dynamic calls (reflection where available) and side loaded applications that are filled with trojan functionality.
In the worst case scenario, the OS maker buries the consent in the Terms of Service.
I believe that every application on iOS already faces the best case, but it may be through static code analysis.
I think that Android does static analysis and I know that it mentions it in the installer, but I'm not sure how they figure it out other than static analysis (maybe a config file like WP7).
WP7 requires a flag be set by the application at a configuration level to have access. If it is flagged, then the request is made to the user. Without the flag, the application cannot request location details.
Regardless, I feel like this is just another thing that really is not necessary for a law to be in place about. Especially not in the manner that it is phrased. That just begs for a single line in the ToS.
For really going after what is a problem in our country.
Not the job market.
Not the national debt.
Not the continued housing crisis.
Not any of the three wars we are actively participating in (Libya, Iraq (yes, still), and Afghanistan).
Not healthcare.
Not the tax system.
Nope, it's little kids or adults showing their support for artists by lip syncing. We really have to protect those artists from such stealing! Those poor, underpaid artists (and their leeches that lobby for them, AKA the RIAA).