The avenue of complaints to ebay is still open. If enough sellers complain to ebay about deadbeat buyers then ebay should suspend the membership of the deadbeat buyer, after some fair process. Problem is, many buyers get around this by re-joining with another email address and another credit card number. Ebay should also remove negative feedback from sellers if the buyer and seller go though a process that resolves the conflict. The negative feedback would stick if the buyers complaint was not resolved. Of course, a buyer who 'cries wolf' too often should have his complaints taken with a lot of grains of salt (unless OTHER buyers have issues with the same seller that he has).
As a seller I try to leave feedback as soon as I receive payment. The buyer has completed his/her part of the deal at this point and there is NOTHING ELSE he/she needs to do for me to rate the sellers feedback score. If the buyer has a problem that is my fault I hope he/she will contact me with enough info for me to correct the issue. I once was selling several modems and by accident had the description of two of them mixed up in several points. My mistake, the seller complained and I offered her the option of a refund, or one of the other modems, and keep the wrong one. She accepted the later, but never left any feedback, maybe the time window had closed.
As a buyer I try to leave feedback after the item is received and inspected. If the item arrived on time, was packed well, and meet the description in the auction I then have all the info I need to leave accurate feedback. If the item is defective, arrives damaged due to poor packing, is NOT as described in the auction, or simply NEVER arrives I then go through the Ebay procedures of contacting the seller, and if need be also register a complaint with ebay and paypal. I've only had to do the latter once, and it was resolved to my satisfaction. Due to the time limit though, I never was able to leave feedback. This is a problem, I should have enough time to go though the process of resolving a dispute and then leave feedback. Sometimes, an honest mistake is made, and if the seller does the right thing, I would want to leave him good feedback for his trouble in making things right.
The company I work for makes whole house audio equipment and programmable remote controls. Our equipment is set up by an installer using a windows based application that downloads configuration data to the microprocessor based equipment. It can also download firmware updates. Our configuration / firmware update application communicates to the equipment over ethernet, or a USB-serial link. The PC application is written using M$'s "Dot Nyet" framework. It works great... under XP. Under Vista however, there are all sorts of problems up to and including corruption of the data and firmware update leaving the equipment being configured a "brick". We don't yet know what the problem is, (bad drivers, in-compatible dot-nyet dll's with Vista, ???). What a hunk of junk! M$ you screwed the pouch!
I've sent emails to RMS at GNU in the past and he actually will reply. He can be dogmatic about his views, but he won't flame you for having a different opinion. He WILL give you a good argument why HE is right and YOU are wrong, but in a VERY polite way. (He's like a true politician, he can tell you to go to hell in such a way that you will look forward to the trip!).
I am an exempt employee and I do put in some overtime when required by a project schedule. Even though the company doesn't have to pay us for our overtime they have "thanked" us for our effort with some perks. Two years in a row they gave the software development team a week's worth of "comp time" (extra vacation time) "under the table" as a reward for the extra time worked. While this wasn't even close to a one-to-one payback for the overtime worked, it was the thought that counted. Put it this way, if they HADN'T done SOMETHING, the next time a project schedule was threatened fewer hours of overtime might have been available from the team.
So when highway speeds drop due to congestion I get charged more toll, but get LESS value for the use of the road. Seems bassakwards to me. If it takes me longer to get to work the toll should DROP to reflect the decreased value of the road.
Well that settles it for me. I won't buy a HD player until Oppo Digital (www.oppodigital.com) comes out with one. Their universal up-converting DVD players support EVERYTHING on ANY KIND of 5.25" optical disk. (3" too). When they come out with an HD player late this year or early next year it will be the one to buy. They haven't announced any plans, but the way things are going it would be a BD or dual format machine.
Actually most (all?) Sony Blue-Ray players WILL output 720p, 1080i and 1080p via component video. My company makes an HD component video switcher box, and we have tested it up to 1080p using a Sony BR player.
Some 20 years ago Pioneer was trying to keep it's Laser Disk product alive. They eventually got third parties to second source the player for a while, but because of the "chicken and egg" problem to bootstrap sales, they had to produce the software as well as the hardware. If Toshiba wants to keep HD-DVD alive, they are going to have to license the software from the studios, press and sell the disks themselves (just like Pioneer did with LD). They can discount the players down to zero and they won't sell without software (except for the fact that some of them do upscale DVD's and will play DVD-Audio, SACD, Divx, CD's, and MP3 CD's).
"The over-50 exemption was created to give states more time to get everyone new licenses, and officials say the risk of someone in that age group being a terrorist, illegal immigrant or con artist is much less." I think Osma is over 50 years old.
Not everybody has a drivers license. What happens to people who have lost theirs (for getting too many tickets), are under age, or just never WANTED to get a driver's license (some people are scared of driving). What kind of ID will these people get?
Many people have umbrella policies in their home owner's insurance. I do. Now many people who own computers and are connected to the internet are buying music from itunes, have a home network to inter-connect more than one PC for resource sharing among computers. And many people own iPods and rip their own CD's using iTunes, leaving the music files on the computer. We all KNOW how secure Windows is against intruders from the internet. It's possible that some downloaded Trojan or Virus could somehow open up our disk files to be viewed from the internet, without our knowledge. And, it's Microsoft's fault for not making Windows secure to this threat.
So, I'm waiting for someone who get's hauled into court to face the RIAA to talk to their insurance company about a claim against their umbrella policy for protection, since this was NOT of their own intentional action, but a result of insecure software / hardware that they purchased. So, insurance company counter sues Microsoft (AND ISP provider, modem / router maker, etc).
There are several ways to define the differences between these two fine desktops. On the technical side KDE uses a true object oriented toolset built on a true object oriented language (c++). Gnome uses GTK, which emulates the the OO environment and is built using a NON OO language (C).
The look and feel of the desktop is unique to each package, and each has it's own set of applications. The good thing is that (by installing the required lib's from each) you CAN run Gnome applications on KDE and visa versa. In fact RH's "blue curve" was an attempt to steal the good things from KDE and make them available in Gnome.
I prefer KDE, but I do wish that some of Gnome's configuration "wizards" were available in KDE. In (k)Ubuntu the Gnome package manager is better than the POS that ships with Kubuntu. I don't even TRY to use symantic, I just go to the command line and use apt-get. (Well, I AM an old Debian user who even remembers how to use dselect!). I do install some Gnome apps here and there.
Ya bring it on. RIAA vs Apple. Now we will see a REAL battle in the courtroom. They will have about as much chance as the MPAA did against Sony back in the late 70's.
1: Cop sitting on the side of the road causes drivers to slow down. 2: Those electronic signs on the highway cause everybody to slow down so they
can read some useless message that doesn't apply to them. 3: People slowing down to rubberneck and take a peek at a dead animal on the side of the road.
The average joe blow who bought a wireless router at Radio Shack and just plugged it in probably has the damn thing as open as a barn door. In fact, open wireless routers are probably the norm, rather than the exception as the number of spam bots would prove.
OK, if you have a 1 amp/hr battery that you want to charge in 5 minutes you have to provide at least 12 amps of charging current (14 gauge wire). A laptop with a 5 amp/hr battery would require 60 Amps to charge (That's 6 gauge wire needed!).
If I EVER catch you filtering *ANYTHING* to my internet connection you will lose my internet business, my phone business and wireless business to the local cable company.
My take on these is that if I leave on my own to seek a better job I might be subject to the terms of such an agreement. OTOH, if I'm laid off of fired for some BS reason (such as to save money), I would consider any such agreement I might have signed null and void.
He discovered by accident that adding a third element to the thermionic diode would control the flow of current through the device. He did NOT understand how it actually worked and as a result was trumped by another inventor who perfected the circuits that used the triode. Deforest used the courts to attempt to gain ownership of those circuits from their actual inventor (Armstrong). The only person more blind than DeForest on the operation of thermionic devices was Edison, who actually discovered effect. If Edison had devoted even a small bit of his usual insight into things on the problem, he might have connected the dots and invented the triode 20 years earlier. Edison was looking into ways of improving long distance telephone circuits and here was the amplifier he was looking for!
A friend of mine used a portable cassette recorder as a red box. He recorded the sound made as the coins hit the phone (had someone call him from a pay phone and drop coins in). Then he just held the recorder to the phone and played it back. (Once once did the operator get suspicious when she heard the tape being rewound).
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The avenue of complaints to ebay is still open. If enough sellers complain to ebay about deadbeat buyers then ebay should suspend the membership of the deadbeat buyer, after some fair process. Problem is, many buyers get around this by re-joining with another email address and another credit card number. Ebay should also remove negative feedback from sellers if the buyer and seller go though a process that resolves the conflict. The negative feedback would stick if the buyers complaint was not resolved. Of course, a buyer who 'cries wolf' too often should have his complaints taken with a lot of grains of salt (unless OTHER buyers have issues with the same seller that he has).
As a seller I try to leave feedback as soon as I receive payment.
The buyer has completed his/her part of the deal at this point and
there is NOTHING ELSE he/she needs to do for me to rate the sellers
feedback score. If the buyer has a problem that is my fault I hope
he/she will contact me with enough info for me to correct the issue.
I once was selling several modems and by accident had the description
of two of them mixed up in several points. My mistake, the seller
complained and I offered her the option of a refund, or one of the
other modems, and keep the wrong one. She accepted the later, but
never left any feedback, maybe the time window had closed.
As a buyer I try to leave feedback after the item is received and inspected.
If the item arrived on time, was packed well, and meet the description in
the auction I then have all the info I need to leave accurate feedback.
If the item is defective, arrives damaged due to poor packing, is NOT as
described in the auction, or simply NEVER arrives I then go through the Ebay
procedures of contacting the seller, and if need be also register a complaint
with ebay and paypal. I've only had to do the latter once, and it was resolved
to my satisfaction. Due to the time limit though, I never was able to leave
feedback. This is a problem, I should have enough time to go though the process
of resolving a dispute and then leave feedback. Sometimes, an honest mistake is
made, and if the seller does the right thing, I would want to leave him good feedback
for his trouble in making things right.
The company I work for makes whole house audio equipment and programmable remote controls. ... under XP. Under Vista however, there are all sorts of problems
Our equipment is set up by an installer using a windows based application that downloads
configuration data to the microprocessor based equipment. It can also download firmware
updates. Our configuration / firmware update application communicates to the equipment
over ethernet, or a USB-serial link. The PC application is written using M$'s "Dot Nyet"
framework. It works great
up to and including corruption of the data and firmware update leaving the equipment being
configured a "brick". We don't yet know what the problem is, (bad drivers, in-compatible
dot-nyet dll's with Vista, ???). What a hunk of junk! M$ you screwed the pouch!
I've sent emails to RMS at GNU in the past and he actually will reply.
He can be dogmatic about his views, but he won't flame you for having
a different opinion. He WILL give you a good argument why HE is right
and YOU are wrong, but in a VERY polite way. (He's like a true politician,
he can tell you to go to hell in such a way that you will look forward to
the trip!).
Rest in Pieces
I am an exempt employee and I do put in some overtime when required by a project schedule.
Even though the company doesn't have to pay us for our overtime they have "thanked" us
for our effort with some perks. Two years in a row they gave the software development team
a week's worth of "comp time" (extra vacation time) "under the table" as a reward for the extra time worked.
While this wasn't even close to a one-to-one payback for the overtime worked, it was the
thought that counted. Put it this way, if they HADN'T done SOMETHING, the next time a project
schedule was threatened fewer hours of overtime might have been available from the team.
So when highway speeds drop due to congestion I get charged more toll, but get LESS value
for the use of the road. Seems bassakwards to me. If it takes me longer to get to work
the toll should DROP to reflect the decreased value of the road.
Well that settles it for me. I won't buy a HD player until Oppo Digital (www.oppodigital.com) comes out with one.
Their universal up-converting DVD players support EVERYTHING on ANY KIND of 5.25" optical disk.
(3" too). When they come out with an HD player late this year or early next year it will be the one to buy. They haven't announced any plans, but the way things are going it would be a BD or dual format machine.
Actually most (all?) Sony Blue-Ray players WILL output 720p, 1080i and 1080p
via component video. My company makes an HD component video switcher box,
and we have tested it up to 1080p using a Sony BR player.
Some 20 years ago Pioneer was trying to keep it's Laser Disk product alive.
They eventually got third parties to second source the player for a while, but
because of the "chicken and egg" problem to bootstrap sales, they had to
produce the software as well as the hardware. If Toshiba wants to keep HD-DVD
alive, they are going to have to license the software from the studios, press and
sell the disks themselves (just like Pioneer did with LD). They can discount the
players down to zero and they won't sell without software (except for the fact that
some of them do upscale DVD's and will play DVD-Audio, SACD, Divx, CD's, and MP3 CD's).
"The over-50 exemption was created to give states more time to get everyone new licenses, and officials say the risk of someone in that age group being a terrorist, illegal immigrant or con artist is much less."
I think Osma is over 50 years old.
Not everybody has a drivers license. What happens to people who have
lost theirs (for getting too many tickets), are under age, or just
never WANTED to get a driver's license (some people are scared of driving).
What kind of ID will these people get?
Many people have umbrella policies in their home owner's insurance. I do.
Now many people who own computers and are connected to the internet are buying music
from itunes, have a home network to inter-connect more than one PC for resource sharing
among computers. And many people own iPods and rip their own CD's using iTunes, leaving
the music files on the computer. We all KNOW how secure Windows is against intruders from
the internet. It's possible that some downloaded Trojan or Virus could somehow open up
our disk files to be viewed from the internet, without our knowledge. And, it's
Microsoft's fault for not making Windows secure to this threat.
So, I'm waiting for someone who get's hauled into court to face the RIAA to talk to their
insurance company about a claim against their umbrella policy for protection, since this
was NOT of their own intentional action, but a result of insecure software / hardware that
they purchased. So, insurance company counter sues Microsoft (AND ISP provider, modem / router
maker, etc).
Where was Newton and Commander Data?
There are several ways to define the differences between these two fine desktops.
On the technical side KDE uses a true object oriented toolset built on a true object oriented
language (c++). Gnome uses GTK, which emulates the the OO environment and is built using a NON OO language
(C).
The look and feel of the desktop is unique to each package, and each has it's own set of applications.
The good thing is that (by installing the required lib's from each) you CAN run Gnome applications on KDE
and visa versa. In fact RH's "blue curve" was an attempt to steal the good things from KDE and make them
available in Gnome.
I prefer KDE, but I do wish that some of Gnome's configuration "wizards" were available in KDE.
In (k)Ubuntu the Gnome package manager is better than the POS that ships with Kubuntu. I don't even TRY to
use symantic, I just go to the command line and use apt-get. (Well, I AM an old Debian user who even
remembers how to use dselect!). I do install some Gnome apps here and there.
Ya bring it on. RIAA vs Apple. Now we will see a REAL battle in the courtroom.
They will have about as much chance as the MPAA did against Sony back in the late 70's.
1: Cop sitting on the side of the road causes drivers to slow down.
2: Those electronic signs on the highway cause everybody to slow down so they
can read some useless message that doesn't apply to them.
3: People slowing down to rubberneck and take a peek at a dead animal on the side of the road.
Just like on the license plate on Dr. Browns DeLorian.
The average joe blow who bought a wireless router at Radio Shack and just plugged it in
probably has the damn thing as open as a barn door. In fact, open wireless routers are
probably the norm, rather than the exception as the number of spam bots would prove.
OK, if you have a 1 amp/hr battery that you want to charge in 5 minutes you have to provide
at least 12 amps of charging current (14 gauge wire). A laptop with a 5 amp/hr battery would require 60 Amps to
charge (That's 6 gauge wire needed!).
If I EVER catch you filtering *ANYTHING* to my internet connection
you will lose my internet business, my phone business and wireless business
to the local cable company.
My take on these is that if I leave on my own to seek a better job I might be subject to the terms of such an agreement. OTOH, if I'm laid off of fired for some BS reason (such as to save money), I would consider any such agreement I might have signed null and void.
He discovered by accident that adding a third element to the thermionic diode would control the flow of current through the device. He did NOT understand how it actually worked and as a result was trumped by another inventor who perfected the circuits that used the triode. Deforest used the courts to attempt to gain ownership of those circuits from their actual inventor (Armstrong). The only person more blind than DeForest on the operation of thermionic devices was Edison, who actually discovered effect. If Edison had devoted even a small bit of his usual insight into things on the problem, he might have connected the dots and invented the triode 20 years earlier. Edison was looking into ways of improving long distance telephone circuits and here was the amplifier he was looking for!
A friend of mine used a portable cassette recorder as a red box.
He recorded the sound made as the coins hit the phone (had someone
call him from a pay phone and drop coins in). Then he just
held the recorder to the phone and played it back. (Once once did
the operator get suspicious when she heard the tape being rewound).
Replace your battery man! (before it explodes!)