Did you happen to catch the ages of all these people involved (50-60 years old)? There's a whole generation of folks out there who don't really feel this is all that much of a "crime".
Add to that, there are some really, really stupid people out there (especially in that area of Chicago) who think that they are somehow invisible to the law, that "everyone is doing it", that it's "ok", and "some big corporation or the freakin' FBI ain't comin' after ME, I'm a nobody, I'm just makin' copies for my buddies from the Moose Lodge. We're on the inside track, we've got an important uncle in Hollywood. Billy Bob is the president of the Moose cause he gets all those cool movies first. And hey, if you want, you get in good with him, he'll give you one of those special TV boxes he makes that gets ya HBO for free. Free man! He's so smart"
With the national news attention this is getting right now, there are a lot of suburban hicks in Chicago today disposing of VHS tapes, burned DVD's and Satellite black boxes. Too bad garbage pickup in most communities is Thursday or Friday (this morning), so I guess you'll see them by the side of the road. And someone's 16 year old son who's dad is about three degrees of separation away from the guy they arrested is having his computer and internet connection removed from his bedroom this afternoon and is grounded for life.
If you or I did something like this they would lock us up and throw away the key!
I love how it seems almost nothing will come of this, yet if one of us were to go and have a peek at their files, we'd be looking at a 20 year prison term, or worse yet, be labeled a "terrorist" and given "enemy combatant" status and shuttled off to Gitmo to never be heard from again.
and actually propose more intervention and control in the form of mandatory advanced rider training.
This debate can go on forever because as another section of your post points out it's a matter of personal opinion, but I'll comment on the above:
One forces education and offers knowledge, the other forces physical conformity and modifies my personal being.
Having the government tell me to go learn how to do something before allowing me to do it is one thing, telling me I *will* wear, change, add, modify or enhance myself while doing it is another thing altogether.
If they were to pass a law which allowed hospitals and doctors to refuse to care for helmetless riders without insurance, I'd definitely support repealing the helmet laws.
Ok, and with that thinking I will support you 100% just as soon as they at the same time stop treating people with AIDS who have unprotected sex and/or not treating homosexual men and IV drug users, and people who don't maintain a healthy diet, and black people with sickle cell (or hell, all hereditary diseases, we'll stop those prone to it from breeding) and last but not least, smokers with cancer. I will then support you in your cause to ease the public healthcare burden.
FREEDOM has it's costs and consequences, and we all share them in this society, even the ones some of us don't agree with.
Again, a helmet in some cases is a good idea, I'm not disputing that. "I" don't think it's a good idea in certain cases *for me* and I'm not too keen on letting you or the federal government make that decision for me.
You're information is a little skewed too, but I'm not going to pick it apart because it can all be summed up in one statement: MOST motorcycle accidents with tragic outcomes are because of two things; not doing anything to avoid the accident or not being prepared enough to even know what to do to avoid the accident. Of course, there's a third case, and that's the unavoidable accident, but there's usually nothing that can save anyone from this. Having an oncoming car take your lane to pass around a curve on a two lane highway and hit you head on has only one outcome and a helmet and all the training in the world ain't gonna save you from that.
It's been studied numerous times and has been discovered for years that in most cases (like 80%) that when presented with the inevitable crash situation the rider does nothing to avoid the collision and does even less to survive the resulting crash. They just sit there. Stare forward at the impending doom and crash. And these riders are almost always people who have never taken a rider training class or safety course.
The #1 type of motorcycle accident as you mentioned is the infamous *I didn't see the motorcycle, left hand turn in front of the rider*. In almost 80% of these accidents there are no skid marks from the motorcycle, there is no evidence of avoidance steering, and the injuries sustained show that the rider did nothing to prepare for impact. They just sit there, stunned, and crash.
I have yet to enter an intersection in the 15 years I've been riding and NOT been 100% prepared for that car with it's turn signal on facing me to actually go ahead and turn left right in front of me, and as such, I'm almost always 100% ready to steer left, right, stop or prepare to launch off the bike over the handlebars if it happens. My eyes are always trained to look for movement on both sides of the road and from sidewalks, driveways, my mirrors and in front of me. I've taken the rider safety course twice, these skills were taught to me there. I've ridden with people who have never taken it, they're usually more tuned in to their radio controls or birds in the sky than the woman who just lost her shopping cart on the supermarket driveway 50 yards in front of us heading for the street or the tire roll of the left hand turner at the intersection we're approaching.
In a crash situation, you're right, a helmet will protect your head from contact with objects. The name of the game though is not to crash. As you said in your message, there are very few motorcyclists you'll meet who have had *two* major crashes. You usually only get one shot at this. Knowing how to avoid an accident and knowing how to make it through one is what will keep you in the wind, just donning a helmet doesn't even cover 1/4 of the preparation though and there are way too many new and even older riders out there who think that's all they need and they'll be ok. They're wrong. As well as the public and government and lobbyists who don't ride trying to put one on every head out there when instead they should be sending them to training classes to teach them how to ride instead of just forcing a piece of fiberglass on their head and telling 'em to have at it.
You opinion of the Hurt report aside, what is your beef with helmets? Is it the "government shouldn't be telling me what to do" angle or the "helmets don't matter for safety anyway" angle?
There's a number of beef's with helmets. First on my list though is that it has in the past and still today been determined that for ordinary traffic driving helmets are unsafe and impairing to the operator. Hence why it is illegal in all 50 states to operate a passenger car, bus or truck while wearing one!
Then there's the "government telling me what to do angle", which probably is tied for number one. I mean, what's next, you must wear a good thick coat in the winter? The helmet law apologists always site the reduction of injuries and public health care costs as a reason for mandatory helmet use, well, the flu certainly costs the public enough money every winter in hospital visits by the uninsured, should we mandate a hat and gloves law?
Helmets are a good idea sometimes, but mainly on the race track, where extreme risks are taken and unforeseen accidents will happen because of the limits being pushed. In everyday use, I'd prefer to choose when "I" feel it's a good idea. Because in a lot of cases it's not, and can even be a hindrance. In downtown urban traffic, I'd rather take the risk of not wearing one than suffer the sensory impairment that comes with wearing one. And I most certainly do not want to be forced by my government and health care cost reduction lobbyists who don't understand what it's like to ride a motorcycle to don cumbersome, uncomfortable and even dangerous (depending on the situation) equipment that impairs my ability to enjoy my sport as I see fit.
The key to safety for motorcycle riding (as with other things) is good preparation of skills, practice and experience in riding correctly and how to stay safe and avoid accidents. Not just slapping on as much armor as you can and flailing off wildly into the sunset hoping the suit holds up when you (inevitably) crash into the wall, or car, or truck, or bus!
The Hurt Report is complete horseshit and has been used over and over again the last 30 years to try and force helmets on riders heads. All it does is support the theory that people get hurt in motorcycle crashes. Well no fucking kidding.
The number one cause of injury in motorcycle accidents is motorcycles being ridden by riders who have not trained themselves how to ride. Inexperience and ignorance are why get people hurt on motorcycles.
If the government and it's citizens want to make a law regarding safe motorcycle use, require all license applicants to take a 6 week motorcycle safety riding/training course as offered by the MSF.
Support your local A.B.A.T.E chapter or other Motorcycle Rights Organization.
Thanks for this post! It's exactly the type of thing I've been wishing someone or something would do to fight back and at least try to wake people up from sitting there and getting pounded in the wallet!
One problem with number portability that everyone is just this week finding out - almost everyone who isn't on a pay-as-you-go plan will have to fork over the early termination fee.
All of the carriers have 1 year contracts or more with all of their customers, no matter what month you are in in your contract, the early termination fee remains the same. In most cases, the early termination fee is 6 months of what the service cost as a whole ($175-$275).
Now it appears from the article, Sprint is actually charging it's customers $2.50 a month for something most of them can't even use, and that's number portability! How nice.
Re:Been going on for year with teleco's
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Yup, I caught AT&T back in 1991 for $0.02.
I forget now how I figured this out, or why I bothered, but something prompted me to add up the charges in the column and I was floored when it came up two cents less than what the total amount due said on the bill at the bottom!
I looked, and looked, and added and re-added, but to no avail, what the charges added up to and what was printed as the final amount due was $0.02 in AT&T's favor.
I called them up and they corrected it without any questions.
I then sat back and thought, how many customers must they have (AT&T Long Distance) and what if they did that to all of them that month? Would anyone else notice? 20 million customers, 30 million, 80 million? All they did was misprint the amount due by two cents and that could have netted them 10's of millions of dollars that would never be asked for.
What really gets me too, as others have mentioned, are all these stupid phone company charges that have come up. Our government fines, taxes, or regulates fees on them, and what do they do, they just transfer them to us indefinitely. I mean think about this, in this digital age with all those fancy switches and hubs the phone company has, do they really need to charge each and every customer in every municipality an extra $0.99 for 911 service anymore?
Another peeve of this new economy we're in are these stupid contracts for service! I can't think of single service other than my electric company (and that's probably about to change) that I'm not bound into a 1 year deal that I can't get out of. DSL, Long Distance, Telephone, Cable, Satellite, Cell phone. It should be made illegal! There's hardly a person left in the United States I'm sure who can go ahead and change their cable or cell phone providers without paying out a years worth of service first to get out of the 1 year or longer contract.
But as per usual, we all just sit back and take it.
As the other guy said, what country are you in? Not the USA. Hell, we just let our congressional representatives enact the Patriot Act on our asses, and nearly none of us complained. It now allows virtually any local, state or federal agency to walk all over us and peek into any part of our lives without asking any of us, or notifying us if it ever occurred!
And Privacy? With grocery store discount cards tied to our social security numbers and every kind of public database searchable by nearly anyone for free ranging in everything from our property records, tax payments, medical records, court appearances, etc, we're hardly a private country anymore. Worse yet, all these fools with "blogs" blabbing all their useless drivel for millions world wide to read and "archive". Privacy here has gone right out the window. Just wait until Walmart installs all those RFID tags in your clothing and food and then "they" can watch and track just about everything you do without even asking!
I did that with my AT&T wireless T68i for 3 days while I was between DSL providers. Bad idea.
AT&T billed me $640 for 50Mb of downloaded data @ something like $13 a Mb.
I argued with them how they could let a $49 a month subscription run up to 11 times it's normal cost without shutting off the handset or calling me, and they said; tough, pay up.
I found it interesting though when I didn't pay up that they shut off the handset 1 minute after it was "overdue" and called me the next day to collect. Strange how that works in the other direction.
I told them I couldn't pay the bill all at once, they didn't want to hear it. So I just doubled the monthly subscription payments and sent that. After 2 months they canceled the contract and charged me $200 for early termination, then charged off the account to a collection agency. I'm now paying the collection agency double what the normal monthly subscription would have been. Should be finished up sometime in 2005.
I'll never be an AT&T customer, for anything, again, ever!
The process or mechanism doesn't matter, nor does it refer to what was being called "unclear", whatever the mechanism, it's very clear that McDonalds will use the download promotion to drive people to their restaurant instead of their competitors!
I could care less about the money, but the promotion has already worked and it's not even started yet for me. I'm a Diet Coke drinker, but I don't plan on buying anything but Diet Pepsi (and lots of it) from February on! I couldn't be happier now either that the vending machine in my building at work sells Pepsi!
I've even asked three family members to please switch to buying any of the three Pepsi products in the promotion beginning in February and to save their bottle caps for me! My aunt and uncle purchase about 3 cases a month of diet soda or lemon lime soda, so they'll at least be good for 24 winning caps!
But no, I don't see it at all as a "value" thing, that's secondary, but if I purchase Diet Coke and buy songs at iTunes Music Store, I'd be a fool economically to NOT buy Pepsi during the promotion, as it would actually save me money!
Umm, I think you missed the gist of the idea here. Apple isn't "giving away" the songs for free, McDonalds is giving Apple 1 billion dollars.
Although I guess the "deal" could work in either direction, Apple could give McDonalds 1 billion dollars in exchange for the recognition or vice versa or they could split the costs. etc.
Either way, this is about advertising, not the fact that the songs are too cheap or too expensive. As a matter of fact, it's been reported many times that Apple is actually loosing money on the music store. The music stores only purpose is to push the sale of iPods, on which they make a nice profit.
You buy a six pack of 20oz Pepsi, Diet Pepsi or Sierra Mist and at least 2 if not 3 of those will have a free song code on the bottle cap. It's just a credit code you enter at the site and you pick any song you want.
1 liter bottles will also have song codes on their caps. There will be 100 million bottles with song codes released.
The promotion will start during the Super Bowl game this February.
The cool thing about these, and Apples new "gift certificate" promotion is, it doesn't matter what country someone is in to redeem them! Hence why the new gift certificates to the iTunes Music Store are being auctioned off on eBay. Anyone anywhere can redeem these and you don't need to enter a US credit card number.
This of course could change in the rules and regulations of the promotion requiring the redeemer to fill out their name address and phone number to claim their prize. IANAL but I think that's illegal when the sweepstakes doesn't require you to register to participate first. If I'm right, Pepsi bottle caps with free song codes will show up on eBay about 10 minutes after they're released.
Anyway, the Pepsi thing starts at the end of February, 1 in 3 Pepsi, Diet Pepsi or Sierra Mist 20oz bottles or 1 liter bottles will have a code on the underside of the bottle cap good for one song of your choosing at the iTunes Music store.
"It is unclear how McDonalds will use the free downloads in a promotional campaign"
Whatever journalist wrote this should be sent home without lunch!
What the hell do you mean unclear?
Here, let's take a stab; Pepsi Co. announces 1 million song giveaway via redeemable codes on their three main product bottle caps. 1 in 3 caps will have a code valued at $0.99. Hundreds of thousands of iTunes Music Store users are now poised and ready to only drink and purchase Pepsi, Diet Pepsi and Sierra Mist for the duration of the promotion because there really is no reason to purchase any other product since none of them are possibly giving you back $3 worth of music per 6 pack!
McDonalds announces promotion where the purchase of any combo meal will include a peel off sticker on the french fry container with 1 code redeemable for a free song valued at $0.99 at the ITMS. Promotion to continue until 1 billion free songs are given away. Millions of iTunes Music Store customers now opt for lunch at McDonalds since it's the only fast food offering where a $4 happy meal includes a $1 song reward. There's no reason to eat at Burger King.
You can watch for these bottle caps and happy meal stickers to be auctioned off enmase on eBay about 3 hours after the first promotion starts.
Collecting iTunes Music Store free song promotion codes will become the new baseball card of the 2004 summer.
Well, since Apple is the inventor and owner of the Firewire standard, the problem that has surfaced is far less "their" fault than it is of the chipset makers skirting around the specifications. All Apple really did was start adhering to their own spec more stringently and as it turns out the chipmakers weren't.
Of course there's only one "look good" solution to this and that is Apple updates Panther to relax a little and then sends a memo to the chipset makers telling them they've got 6 months to get their product in line or it's going to break again.
But in the true industry changing fashion that Apple is known for they won't. And once again they'll force the compliance of their third party contributors through attrition (or firmware updates that shouldn't be necessary in the first place).
The tail doesn't wag the dog with Apple on their own technologies.
Ok, so lemme get this straight, the guy hypenated his name so it a) appears lower in the directory listing. Or b) becomes the most common sirname in the United States?
Ok there's always c) Mrs. Smith is not only his wife but his dominatrix and if he wanted to get that red rubber ball out of his mouth he had to do it once she OwNeD him.
Yup, you're so right. I just went and played again with installing Quark 6.0 onto another machine.
When you don't have an internet connection or you're already past your "one" alotted internet activation you have to click the "use phone" button which brings you to an "enter activation code" window. There it gives you the phone number to call and I would guess they'll read you a new 40 character code to type in.
I'm sure someone already has their security scheme cracked and codes are out on the net so all you have to do is force that "enter code" window to appear and enter the cracked code and away ya go until the next time it breaks.
This is the first time "I've" encountered DRM where, as some others have said, it's actually easier to use the "crack" than it is to use the software legitimately.
Yes, there's an alternative to Quark. Adobe InDesign.
And I've been trying like hell to get my users to switch. I've hated having to give Quark money for years. They are the most notorius customer un-friendly company on the Mac.
The problem is, a lot of my designers are not the youngest most flexable people, and they also don't have to deal with Quark directly, I do. They're old school design students who spent a lot of money and time "training" to use QuarkXpress. The idea of just jumping to a new layout tool scares them because the learning time might diminish their skills and/or they might never get to the same level they're at with Quark. This is causing great resistance to my efforts of switching to InDesign which I've been pushing for over a year and a half.
But now it seems, even InDesign might go this DRM route too, thank god it currently doesn't, nor does Photoshop or Illustrator; yet.
The big problem that some of us who are in the demographic that read/. overlook is our users are most times not "in love" with their computers and the act of using the computer. It's nothing more than a tool with which they do something else. In most cases something they used to do in an "analog" fashion. So jumping to the latest and greatest little software widget is not something they're really interested in doing. They know how to use the one tool that came along to help them do their job on the box instead of on a table and that's all the thought that ever really went into the whole "computer" thing. They don't know (or care) what OS they're using, what capabilities it has, etc. So scouring the net and freshmeat, etc, isn't part of their daily activity. And most likely never will be. They're trained and know how to do their job. And in this case, their job is laying out pages for print, and the tool they learned is QuarkXpress. It's not tinkering with the beige box on their desk and seeing which new software gadget they can install today to help them work better.
And my doing so for them and suggesting alternatives is usually only met with fear, not jubilation that a new, better, tool exists.
In stark contrast to this model are my Web Developement users who are the opposite. I ususally have to take tools away from them or discourage their use because "I" don't even know what they are or how to "support" them if something goes awry. But this keeps "me" on my toes and makes my job enjoyable. "I" like tinkering with the begie box, and my job is making sure the ones in my deptarment stay up and running smoothly. It's a far cry from the folks who see the computer as a new fangled "hammer" for doing their job of "pounding nails" and their only interest is in the pounding of nails, not hammer design.
I have to update my above post 'cause I forgot than it's even more restrictive that I mentioned (I knew there was a reason I was so pissed about this a few weeks ago).
As it turns out, you only get to "activate" your copy over the internet once! That's right, your initial installation is all you get with the quick and easy install. If you change machines or MOVE the software, it has to be activated again, but that WON'T happen over the internet. For that, you HAVE to call a LONG DISTANCE number and speak to someone and explain to them WHY you are moving the software. And then prove your purchase to them with you validation code from the card that came with the original packaging.
So that means, in 6 months, when I do those 37 machine upgrades for my users running QuarkXpress 6.0, I will have to make 37 long distance phone calls to area code 303 in order to use the copies of QuarkXpress 6.0 my company bought and paid for!
No, OS X is not DRM resistant. What do you think iTunes and the iTuens music store does? Try taking those AAC files you bought at iTMS and putting them on your new Mac and playing them without connecting to the internet first to "activate" that copy of iTunes.
Anyway, all that aside, Quark 6.0 for OS X does this same activation thing that Adobe is doing here, before it will run it has to "activate" by phoning home over the net, if your computer doesn't have a network connection you are instructed to call a 1-800 number (which connect to a call center in India) and read them your 40 character validation number off the card that ships in the upgrade box and at that point they will then issue you a 40 character "activation" code. Once that's done the software will finish launching and you can work. If you can't provide the activation step it quits before getting past the splash screen when loading.
The kicker most people are finding with this is, the "activation" seems to marry itself to the hardware connected to the machine at the time of activation. Changing an Ethernet card or adding a hard disk will cause the activation to change and fail, at which time you have to go through the whole activation process again. You only have three chances to do this over the net, the third time you have to call the 800 number and explain why this is happening.
Basically as a poster above mentioned, they want to control how you use and where you use this software package that they've charged you $800+ to "purchase".
No big deal right if you're using the software legally, have a readily available internet connection etc. Well, what about the unforseen. I have Quark 6.0 installed on 37 PowerMac G4's at work that I'm responsible for. In 6 months these workstations will be upgraded to G5's. That's 37 copy's of Quark that will have to be reactivated after CPU upgrade. Gee, I hope their activation server is working that day, otherwise I guess I'll have to explain to the designers that they'll just have to go home because the tool that we purchased for them won't work until the guy that owns the tool company comes over and makes sure we're using the tool in the fashion he deems acceptable. Their deadlines and work flow will just have to wait because what should have been a 2 hour machine upgrade/swap is now going to be a "wait and see until Quark can bless us with their approval" on the software we "bought" from them.
On the other hand, I guess the've successfully screwed the "warez" kids, unless someone has figured out how to spoof their activation server, but at the same time they've seriously pissed off their legitmate users.
Sheesh, have we become such babies that if the little light-up box can't do something then it just won't get done.
Um, if the computers won't work in the shipping dept. set them aside while the/.er's fix 'em and revert back to what you did BEFORE you had the things in the first place and just back-enter the data when they're working.
Withholding beer should be an act of terrorism! Especially in Mississippi!
Regarding the price. I went and did a comparison on both web sites. Seems it pretty much an even matchup in price. Apple comes out a little better than $100 ahead.
Alienware Aurora: $3,388US
Apple Dual 2Ghz: $3,249US
I selected options that put the RAM, Hard drive, Video card and Optical drive as the same.
I had to upgrade the RAM on the stock Apple. On the Aurora I had to upgrade the hard disk and the video card and the optical drive from stock.
There is no dual processor option for the Aurora, and being a Mac guy I'm not sure of this but I don't think there's a version of Windows that would support or take the slightest advantage of two processors. OS X on the otherhand does for some functions and certainly assists other apps in doing so.
So I would imagine if there were a "dual" Aurora it wouldn't even be close to the Apple dualie pricewise. But without that consideration, the two boxes are almost the same price.
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Add to that, there are some really, really stupid people out there (especially in that area of Chicago) who think that they are somehow invisible to the law, that "everyone is doing it", that it's "ok", and "some big corporation or the freakin' FBI ain't comin' after ME, I'm a nobody, I'm just makin' copies for my buddies from the Moose Lodge. We're on the inside track, we've got an important uncle in Hollywood. Billy Bob is the president of the Moose cause he gets all those cool movies first. And hey, if you want, you get in good with him, he'll give you one of those special TV boxes he makes that gets ya HBO for free. Free man! He's so smart"
With the national news attention this is getting right now, there are a lot of suburban hicks in Chicago today disposing of VHS tapes, burned DVD's and Satellite black boxes. Too bad garbage pickup in most communities is Thursday or Friday (this morning), so I guess you'll see them by the side of the road. And someone's 16 year old son who's dad is about three degrees of separation away from the guy they arrested is having his computer and internet connection removed from his bedroom this afternoon and is grounded for life.
I love how it seems almost nothing will come of this, yet if one of us were to go and have a peek at their files, we'd be looking at a 20 year prison term, or worse yet, be labeled a "terrorist" and given "enemy combatant" status and shuttled off to Gitmo to never be heard from again.
One forces education and offers knowledge, the other forces physical conformity and modifies my personal being.
Having the government tell me to go learn how to do something before allowing me to do it is one thing, telling me I *will* wear, change, add, modify or enhance myself while doing it is another thing altogether.
Ok, and with that thinking I will support you 100% just as soon as they at the same time stop treating people with AIDS who have unprotected sex and/or not treating homosexual men and IV drug users, and people who don't maintain a healthy diet, and black people with sickle cell (or hell, all hereditary diseases, we'll stop those prone to it from breeding) and last but not least, smokers with cancer. I will then support you in your cause to ease the public healthcare burden.
FREEDOM has it's costs and consequences, and we all share them in this society, even the ones some of us don't agree with.
It's been studied numerous times and has been discovered for years that in most cases (like 80%) that when presented with the inevitable crash situation the rider does nothing to avoid the collision and does even less to survive the resulting crash. They just sit there. Stare forward at the impending doom and crash. And these riders are almost always people who have never taken a rider training class or safety course.
The #1 type of motorcycle accident as you mentioned is the infamous *I didn't see the motorcycle, left hand turn in front of the rider*. In almost 80% of these accidents there are no skid marks from the motorcycle, there is no evidence of avoidance steering, and the injuries sustained show that the rider did nothing to prepare for impact. They just sit there, stunned, and crash.
I have yet to enter an intersection in the 15 years I've been riding and NOT been 100% prepared for that car with it's turn signal on facing me to actually go ahead and turn left right in front of me, and as such, I'm almost always 100% ready to steer left, right, stop or prepare to launch off the bike over the handlebars if it happens. My eyes are always trained to look for movement on both sides of the road and from sidewalks, driveways, my mirrors and in front of me. I've taken the rider safety course twice, these skills were taught to me there. I've ridden with people who have never taken it, they're usually more tuned in to their radio controls or birds in the sky than the woman who just lost her shopping cart on the supermarket driveway 50 yards in front of us heading for the street or the tire roll of the left hand turner at the intersection we're approaching.
In a crash situation, you're right, a helmet will protect your head from contact with objects. The name of the game though is not to crash. As you said in your message, there are very few motorcyclists you'll meet who have had *two* major crashes. You usually only get one shot at this. Knowing how to avoid an accident and knowing how to make it through one is what will keep you in the wind, just donning a helmet doesn't even cover 1/4 of the preparation though and there are way too many new and even older riders out there who think that's all they need and they'll be ok. They're wrong. As well as the public and government and lobbyists who don't ride trying to put one on every head out there when instead they should be sending them to training classes to teach them how to ride instead of just forcing a piece of fiberglass on their head and telling 'em to have at it.
There's a number of beef's with helmets. First on my list though is that it has in the past and still today been determined that for ordinary traffic driving helmets are unsafe and impairing to the operator. Hence why it is illegal in all 50 states to operate a passenger car, bus or truck while wearing one!
Then there's the "government telling me what to do angle", which probably is tied for number one. I mean, what's next, you must wear a good thick coat in the winter? The helmet law apologists always site the reduction of injuries and public health care costs as a reason for mandatory helmet use, well, the flu certainly costs the public enough money every winter in hospital visits by the uninsured, should we mandate a hat and gloves law?
Helmets are a good idea sometimes, but mainly on the race track, where extreme risks are taken and unforeseen accidents will happen because of the limits being pushed. In everyday use, I'd prefer to choose when "I" feel it's a good idea. Because in a lot of cases it's not, and can even be a hindrance. In downtown urban traffic, I'd rather take the risk of not wearing one than suffer the sensory impairment that comes with wearing one. And I most certainly do not want to be forced by my government and health care cost reduction lobbyists who don't understand what it's like to ride a motorcycle to don cumbersome, uncomfortable and even dangerous (depending on the situation) equipment that impairs my ability to enjoy my sport as I see fit.
The key to safety for motorcycle riding (as with other things) is good preparation of skills, practice and experience in riding correctly and how to stay safe and avoid accidents. Not just slapping on as much armor as you can and flailing off wildly into the sunset hoping the suit holds up when you (inevitably) crash into the wall, or car, or truck, or bus!
The number one cause of injury in motorcycle accidents is motorcycles being ridden by riders who have not trained themselves how to ride. Inexperience and ignorance are why get people hurt on motorcycles.
If the government and it's citizens want to make a law regarding safe motorcycle use, require all license applicants to take a 6 week motorcycle safety riding/training course as offered by the MSF.
Support your local A.B.A.T.E chapter or other Motorcycle Rights Organization.
Let those who ride decide!
Thanks for this post! It's exactly the type of thing I've been wishing someone or something would do to fight back and at least try to wake people up from sitting there and getting pounded in the wallet!
All of the carriers have 1 year contracts or more with all of their customers, no matter what month you are in in your contract, the early termination fee remains the same. In most cases, the early termination fee is 6 months of what the service cost as a whole ($175-$275).
Now it appears from the article, Sprint is actually charging it's customers $2.50 a month for something most of them can't even use, and that's number portability! How nice.
I forget now how I figured this out, or why I bothered, but something prompted me to add up the charges in the column and I was floored when it came up two cents less than what the total amount due said on the bill at the bottom!
I looked, and looked, and added and re-added, but to no avail, what the charges added up to and what was printed as the final amount due was $0.02 in AT&T's favor.
I called them up and they corrected it without any questions.
I then sat back and thought, how many customers must they have (AT&T Long Distance) and what if they did that to all of them that month? Would anyone else notice? 20 million customers, 30 million, 80 million? All they did was misprint the amount due by two cents and that could have netted them 10's of millions of dollars that would never be asked for.
What really gets me too, as others have mentioned, are all these stupid phone company charges that have come up. Our government fines, taxes, or regulates fees on them, and what do they do, they just transfer them to us indefinitely. I mean think about this, in this digital age with all those fancy switches and hubs the phone company has, do they really need to charge each and every customer in every municipality an extra $0.99 for 911 service anymore?
Another peeve of this new economy we're in are these stupid contracts for service! I can't think of single service other than my electric company (and that's probably about to change) that I'm not bound into a 1 year deal that I can't get out of. DSL, Long Distance, Telephone, Cable, Satellite, Cell phone. It should be made illegal! There's hardly a person left in the United States I'm sure who can go ahead and change their cable or cell phone providers without paying out a years worth of service first to get out of the 1 year or longer contract.
But as per usual, we all just sit back and take it.
And Privacy? With grocery store discount cards tied to our social security numbers and every kind of public database searchable by nearly anyone for free ranging in everything from our property records, tax payments, medical records, court appearances, etc, we're hardly a private country anymore. Worse yet, all these fools with "blogs" blabbing all their useless drivel for millions world wide to read and "archive". Privacy here has gone right out the window. Just wait until Walmart installs all those RFID tags in your clothing and food and then "they" can watch and track just about everything you do without even asking!
AT&T billed me $640 for 50Mb of downloaded data @ something like $13 a Mb.
I argued with them how they could let a $49 a month subscription run up to 11 times it's normal cost without shutting off the handset or calling me, and they said; tough, pay up.
I found it interesting though when I didn't pay up that they shut off the handset 1 minute after it was "overdue" and called me the next day to collect. Strange how that works in the other direction.
I told them I couldn't pay the bill all at once, they didn't want to hear it. So I just doubled the monthly subscription payments and sent that. After 2 months they canceled the contract and charged me $200 for early termination, then charged off the account to a collection agency. I'm now paying the collection agency double what the normal monthly subscription would have been. Should be finished up sometime in 2005.
I'll never be an AT&T customer, for anything, again, ever!
The process or mechanism doesn't matter, nor does it refer to what was being called "unclear", whatever the mechanism, it's very clear that McDonalds will use the download promotion to drive people to their restaurant instead of their competitors!
I've even asked three family members to please switch to buying any of the three Pepsi products in the promotion beginning in February and to save their bottle caps for me! My aunt and uncle purchase about 3 cases a month of diet soda or lemon lime soda, so they'll at least be good for 24 winning caps!
But no, I don't see it at all as a "value" thing, that's secondary, but if I purchase Diet Coke and buy songs at iTunes Music Store, I'd be a fool economically to NOT buy Pepsi during the promotion, as it would actually save me money!
Although I guess the "deal" could work in either direction, Apple could give McDonalds 1 billion dollars in exchange for the recognition or vice versa or they could split the costs. etc.
Either way, this is about advertising, not the fact that the songs are too cheap or too expensive. As a matter of fact, it's been reported many times that Apple is actually loosing money on the music store. The music stores only purpose is to push the sale of iPods, on which they make a nice profit.
1 liter bottles will also have song codes on their caps. There will be 100 million bottles with song codes released.
The promotion will start during the Super Bowl game this February.
The cool thing about these, and Apples new "gift certificate" promotion is, it doesn't matter what country someone is in to redeem them! Hence why the new gift certificates to the iTunes Music Store are being auctioned off on eBay. Anyone anywhere can redeem these and you don't need to enter a US credit card number.
This of course could change in the rules and regulations of the promotion requiring the redeemer to fill out their name address and phone number to claim their prize. IANAL but I think that's illegal when the sweepstakes doesn't require you to register to participate first. If I'm right, Pepsi bottle caps with free song codes will show up on eBay about 10 minutes after they're released.
Anyway, the Pepsi thing starts at the end of February, 1 in 3 Pepsi, Diet Pepsi or Sierra Mist 20oz bottles or 1 liter bottles will have a code on the underside of the bottle cap good for one song of your choosing at the iTunes Music store.
Whatever journalist wrote this should be sent home without lunch!
What the hell do you mean unclear?
Here, let's take a stab; Pepsi Co. announces 1 million song giveaway via redeemable codes on their three main product bottle caps. 1 in 3 caps will have a code valued at $0.99. Hundreds of thousands of iTunes Music Store users are now poised and ready to only drink and purchase Pepsi, Diet Pepsi and Sierra Mist for the duration of the promotion because there really is no reason to purchase any other product since none of them are possibly giving you back $3 worth of music per 6 pack!
McDonalds announces promotion where the purchase of any combo meal will include a peel off sticker on the french fry container with 1 code redeemable for a free song valued at $0.99 at the ITMS. Promotion to continue until 1 billion free songs are given away. Millions of iTunes Music Store customers now opt for lunch at McDonalds since it's the only fast food offering where a $4 happy meal includes a $1 song reward. There's no reason to eat at Burger King.
You can watch for these bottle caps and happy meal stickers to be auctioned off enmase on eBay about 3 hours after the first promotion starts.
Collecting iTunes Music Store free song promotion codes will become the new baseball card of the 2004 summer.
Of course there's only one "look good" solution to this and that is Apple updates Panther to relax a little and then sends a memo to the chipset makers telling them they've got 6 months to get their product in line or it's going to break again.
But in the true industry changing fashion that Apple is known for they won't. And once again they'll force the compliance of their third party contributors through attrition (or firmware updates that shouldn't be necessary in the first place).
The tail doesn't wag the dog with Apple on their own technologies.
Ok, so lemme get this straight, the guy hypenated his name so it a) appears lower in the directory listing. Or b) becomes the most common sirname in the United States?
Ok there's always c) Mrs. Smith is not only his wife but his dominatrix and if he wanted to get that red rubber ball out of his mouth he had to do it once she OwNeD him.
When you don't have an internet connection or you're already past your "one" alotted internet activation you have to click the "use phone" button which brings you to an "enter activation code" window. There it gives you the phone number to call and I would guess they'll read you a new 40 character code to type in.
I'm sure someone already has their security scheme cracked and codes are out on the net so all you have to do is force that "enter code" window to appear and enter the cracked code and away ya go until the next time it breaks.
This is the first time "I've" encountered DRM where, as some others have said, it's actually easier to use the "crack" than it is to use the software legitimately.
And I've been trying like hell to get my users to switch. I've hated having to give Quark money for years. They are the most notorius customer un-friendly company on the Mac.
The problem is, a lot of my designers are not the youngest most flexable people, and they also don't have to deal with Quark directly, I do. They're old school design students who spent a lot of money and time "training" to use QuarkXpress. The idea of just jumping to a new layout tool scares them because the learning time might diminish their skills and/or they might never get to the same level they're at with Quark. This is causing great resistance to my efforts of switching to InDesign which I've been pushing for over a year and a half.
But now it seems, even InDesign might go this DRM route too, thank god it currently doesn't, nor does Photoshop or Illustrator; yet.
The big problem that some of us who are in the demographic that read /. overlook is our users are most times not "in love" with their computers and the act of using the computer. It's nothing more than a tool with which they do something else. In most cases something they used to do in an "analog" fashion. So jumping to the latest and greatest little software widget is not something they're really interested in doing. They know how to use the one tool that came along to help them do their job on the box instead of on a table and that's all the thought that ever really went into the whole "computer" thing. They don't know (or care) what OS they're using, what capabilities it has, etc. So scouring the net and freshmeat, etc, isn't part of their daily activity. And most likely never will be. They're trained and know how to do their job. And in this case, their job is laying out pages for print, and the tool they learned is QuarkXpress. It's not tinkering with the beige box on their desk and seeing which new software gadget they can install today to help them work better.
And my doing so for them and suggesting alternatives is usually only met with fear, not jubilation that a new, better, tool exists.
In stark contrast to this model are my Web Developement users who are the opposite. I ususally have to take tools away from them or discourage their use because "I" don't even know what they are or how to "support" them if something goes awry. But this keeps "me" on my toes and makes my job enjoyable. "I" like tinkering with the begie box, and my job is making sure the ones in my deptarment stay up and running smoothly. It's a far cry from the folks who see the computer as a new fangled "hammer" for doing their job of "pounding nails" and their only interest is in the pounding of nails, not hammer design.
As it turns out, you only get to "activate" your copy over the internet once! That's right, your initial installation is all you get with the quick and easy install. If you change machines or MOVE the software, it has to be activated again, but that WON'T happen over the internet. For that, you HAVE to call a LONG DISTANCE number and speak to someone and explain to them WHY you are moving the software. And then prove your purchase to them with you validation code from the card that came with the original packaging.
So that means, in 6 months, when I do those 37 machine upgrades for my users running QuarkXpress 6.0, I will have to make 37 long distance phone calls to area code 303 in order to use the copies of QuarkXpress 6.0 my company bought and paid for!
Anyway, all that aside, Quark 6.0 for OS X does this same activation thing that Adobe is doing here, before it will run it has to "activate" by phoning home over the net, if your computer doesn't have a network connection you are instructed to call a 1-800 number (which connect to a call center in India) and read them your 40 character validation number off the card that ships in the upgrade box and at that point they will then issue you a 40 character "activation" code. Once that's done the software will finish launching and you can work. If you can't provide the activation step it quits before getting past the splash screen when loading.
The kicker most people are finding with this is, the "activation" seems to marry itself to the hardware connected to the machine at the time of activation. Changing an Ethernet card or adding a hard disk will cause the activation to change and fail, at which time you have to go through the whole activation process again. You only have three chances to do this over the net, the third time you have to call the 800 number and explain why this is happening.
Basically as a poster above mentioned, they want to control how you use and where you use this software package that they've charged you $800+ to "purchase".
No big deal right if you're using the software legally, have a readily available internet connection etc. Well, what about the unforseen. I have Quark 6.0 installed on 37 PowerMac G4's at work that I'm responsible for. In 6 months these workstations will be upgraded to G5's. That's 37 copy's of Quark that will have to be reactivated after CPU upgrade. Gee, I hope their activation server is working that day, otherwise I guess I'll have to explain to the designers that they'll just have to go home because the tool that we purchased for them won't work until the guy that owns the tool company comes over and makes sure we're using the tool in the fashion he deems acceptable. Their deadlines and work flow will just have to wait because what should have been a 2 hour machine upgrade/swap is now going to be a "wait and see until Quark can bless us with their approval" on the software we "bought" from them.
On the other hand, I guess the've successfully screwed the "warez" kids, unless someone has figured out how to spoof their activation server, but at the same time they've seriously pissed off their legitmate users.
Um, if the computers won't work in the shipping dept. set them aside while the /.er's fix 'em and revert back to what you did BEFORE you had the things in the first place and just back-enter the data when they're working.
Withholding beer should be an act of terrorism! Especially in Mississippi!
Alienware Aurora: $3,388US
Apple Dual 2Ghz: $3,249US
I selected options that put the RAM, Hard drive, Video card and Optical drive as the same.
I had to upgrade the RAM on the stock Apple. On the Aurora I had to upgrade the hard disk and the video card and the optical drive from stock.
There is no dual processor option for the Aurora, and being a Mac guy I'm not sure of this but I don't think there's a version of Windows that would support or take the slightest advantage of two processors. OS X on the otherhand does for some functions and certainly assists other apps in doing so.
So I would imagine if there were a "dual" Aurora it wouldn't even be close to the Apple dualie pricewise. But without that consideration, the two boxes are almost the same price.