The 10 years when WinMo was a major player was characterized by NO consumer choice after the original purchase. Blackberry and Palm were the same way. Now the consumer is beginning to understand the benefits of having an open platform untied to their carrier. So if Android phones get locked down to the same level that WinMo, Palm, and Blackberries where for years then it will have to compete on crutches with the iPhone. Sure there are unlocked phones available but not enough to justify a vibrant marketplace al la iTunes.
How is the 'Droid' not locked down to Verizon? You can not move a Verizon Droid to Sprint another CDMA carrier can you? Can you sell it to anyone elsewhere in the world for use? What will a Droid be worth in two years to anyone? Some are anxious about what a Droid will be worth in six months with all the better Google phones in development.
People can sell used iPhones two years old overseas for the same amount of money they paid for them when new. Isn't that what you would call a vibrant marketplace? I have gone through four or five iPhones and my cost has been almost nil except for the normal carrier monthly charge everyone faces.
The other thing you've done is probably continued to pay them in the form of apps or possibly music. In fact, Apple is very interested in keeping you happy since they have alternate revenue streams (in addition to buying a new phone).
Mobile carriers are only interested in getting you to pay them as much per month as possible... Hence disabling most functionality of the phone unless you pay extra "service fees" to access those functions. My own case: Verizon only allows applications in a token way... If I get a new phone, I have to buy the apps that I want all over again if I get them out of their store.
Most other device makers are more interested in getting you to buy the newest toy. Which is why they aren't too keen on keeping them updated, or even working after you've paid for it.
Why do so few see that is why the Apple iPhone is hands down a far better experience for the user? They do not care if you buy the latest toy. They keep improving the iPhone you have already bought with free software updates.
You are not captive to any one carrier rolling out an approved update for the iPhone as updates are instantly available through iTunes when the iPhone is connected. iTunes even remembers to periodically double check for you to make sure everything is updated and you didn't miss anything. iTunes even updates 1 to hundreds of apps a day automatically when you sync. Look at the pain everyone else experiences trying to keep everything updated if it is even possible on their phone.
If several people spot a fixable iPhone problem with your current hardware, Apple fixes it fairly quickly and rolls out an instant update sometimes many times during the year. There is no long wait as seen with the other vendors and manufacturers.
If you buy and new model iPhone ir iPod all your purchases are transferred to the new device at no charge. If you kept the old one too, Apple doesn't care, you can use the software on both purchases at no extra charge.
Everything about Apple is in reality a better experience for the majority of the population compared to the alternatives.
Geothermal Project in California Is Shut Down
By JAMES GLANZ
Published: December 11, 2009
The company in charge of a California project to extract vast amounts of renewable energy from deep, hot bedrock has removed its drill rig and informed federal officials that the government project will be abandoned.
AltaRock Energy has told the Department of Energy it has removed its drill rig, shown above in May, from a Northern California site and abandoned the project.
A method of tapping energy from bedrock has been linked to increased earthquake activity.
The project by the company, AltaRock Energy, was the Obama administration’s first major test of geothermal energy as a significant alternative to fossil fuels and the project was being financed with federal Department of Energy money at a site about 100 miles north of San Francisco called the Geysers.
But on Friday, the Energy Department said that AltaRock had given notice this week that “it will not be continuing work at the Geysers”.
The original app store for the Android is pretty poor.
Next year I imagine you'll get Android handsets for less than £100 on Pay-As-You-Go contracts. Once handsets at that kind of price start appearing, the user base will *explode*.
NEXT YEAR?
The Droid has today seen a price cut to $149 on Amazon and $119 at the Dell Store. That huge price cut is just three weeks after it's release.
CNN Tech article on developing for Android:
http://www.cnn.com/2009/TECH/11/17/android.wired/index.html
Will developers get stuck building for the "least common denominator" of 'droid phones? Or develop for specific models / versions / capabilities?
Throw in phone vendor and carrier OS customizations and the Android app marketplace could get hard to live with...
It has already happened to small developers who find they are overwhelmed by twelve different Android phones already. Their applications have to be tweaked for each one.
No one says what will happen when Google, the carrier, or the vendor changes the firmware with an update for anyone phone. It has become a developer's nightmare.
The thing most hurting the Android store is piracy. Period. Even worse, many users, for the cost of $0.99, of which.60 went to the developer, demand $20k/year level support and if they don't get it, bad mouth the hell out of the developer and the application. Hell, most of the time users just leave shitty comments on the market .
This means the only rescue for Android is to lock down the platform - not likely - or for people the kick, every pirate they know, in the nuts for destroying what was to be the an excellent mobile platform. I already know two developers how have been forced to leave the platform. A third isn't far away. Simply put - pirates suck.
BINGO
This what I have already observed. It is too easy to pirate Android software, so who is going to invest time and money developing anything really good for Android?
If there isn't the same quality and quantity found with Apple then no reasonable informed person will waste their money for an inferior experience.
They would be better off buying a shirt pocket iPod Touch with WiFi and a cheap phone without the huge monthly expense of the Androids.
If people saw their phones as personal computers, Android's model would be more successful. However, it doesn't seem to fit in with how most people use their phones. It will find purchase among the small segment of the market that enjoys endlessly tinkering with their gadgets, or philosophically oppose closed designs enough to forgo the iPhone, but the majority of the population will continue to flock to the iPhone.
Those who have a mindset to choose one of the many different variations of Android are enthralled with the idea of getting something for free. To make real money on that platform you would have to serve a lot of click advertising which mars the user experience. Google has already decided that is where their money is and some ads now appear on the home screen of the new Droid.
These are the exact same ones who if they owned an iPhone would be pirating all the games' they could instead of actually purchasing them. That pretty much means you are not going to make any money developing a game for the Android. It also would indicate there will be an even stronger pirate community that will rapidly develop around Android to the dismay of legitimate developers.
Second if you look at the free GPS app that Google had for the Android and compare it to the GPS aps on the iPhone you will discover an interesting flaw. GPS apps that do not store their map data on the handset like a normal PND are not very good when you loose a cellular signal or have a weak one in the boonies. This is the type of app Google has. It is blown away by the dedicated GPS apps available on the iPhone that store their map data on the iPhone which are far faster and more responsive.
But the sheer fact that Google gives away a GPS map precludes any reasonable PND vendor from even bothering to port their GPS app to an Android as they would be competing with FREE by the OS vendor. The awkward Android OS rules for storing data on a Gphone do not help either.
I see no future in Android when compared to an iPhone. It will be just another open source project like Linux that will be hard to monetize.
Think it through.
Verizon churn is up with the cream of their customers switching to AT&T and the iPhone.
You raise the EFT to incredible levels to discourage people from leaving. It stops future churn.
You sneak the ETF in on existing customers by having them make some minor change to their contract, they do not realize they are locked in at the new ETF. It stops future churn.
You run misleading ads designed to instill fear in your customers that the iPhone network is very poor and they will not have any phone service. It stops future churn.
You get an exclusive on some piece of hardware and promote it as the best thing since sliced bread and only on the Verizon network. It stops current churn, especially by adding the $350 ETF once the customer signs.
It is all a clever scheme to deal with an evolving Verizon problem, many of their best customers are willing to change networks just to get an iPhone. They must be stopped by any means.
They then said, I'd have to pay $350. They consider family plans two seperate lines. I'd pay $175 each. Funny how it is two lines for cancellation purposes, but one plan as far as getting new phones. The weird part is that I was convinced my cancellation fee was $150 when I signed the contract.
They explained that all prices and fees can be changed at any time during the contract, and that raised my cancellation fee over the life of the contract. I was pretty livid. I ended up waiting a few months and then jumping to AT&T. Now I have a phone that doesn't get signal in half the town, but I never want to go back to Verizon's service again.
Wow, did anyone else get that. With the new ETF at $350, if you have a family plan you are out a minim of $700 or $1050 (if three phones are on the Verizon family plan). These new fees are a killer if a family breadwinner looses a job and they have to cut back.
The way Verizon structures it they will think a long time before the drop Verizon cellular. They may drop cable, internet and more before they bite the bullet and drop Verizon.
Motorola already sells a better version of the Droid in Europe.
The one Verizon has is a first generation model developed exclusively for Verizon. I think it is funny that Verizon is so worried about future churn from those who sign up for Droid that they had to double the early termination fee to hold onto these customers.
The people who are the heaviest users and the most dissatisfied with the service will pretty quickly cough up the ETF and switch to the first competitor that offers it. After a few months, this alone may very well have a noticeable effect on network performance.
More importantly, though, as AT&T actually begins to feel the financial effects of fleeing iPhone users, they're going to have no choice but to ramp up the infrastructure upgrades to compete. In other words, the market will actually start working like it's supposed to.
How do you explain Verizon's switch to a heft $350 ETF for Droid and BlackBerry users on Nov 16? It looks to me like they fear new offerings on AT&T will continue to draw the cream of their user base. There are only a handful of users who have bought droid as of today but to read the posts on Gizmodo they have already discovered a lot of pain compared to the AT&T iPhone. No one seems really thought through what they were going to give up by picking up a Droid.
The funniest Gizmodo recommendation was for Droid users to also buy a Zune in order to do video and TV if that is what they want. This sort of discovery causes dissatisfied people to want to immediately get rid of their new high tech toy.
<quote><p>I think that the 'Out of Touch' phrasing is accurate in this context</p></quote>
<p>I disagree - they are trying to give people the distinct impression that you won't be able to communicate. The commercial even shows some sad AT&T network girl alone on a bench somewhere while her Verizon network friends are together having fun. Yes there is a speed difference between 3G and Edge, but give me a break... you can still send/receive calls, texts, and still get online.</p></quote>
What is worse, in real life there is Wi-Fi everywhere on a modern campus, so the girl with the iPhone could be surfing YouTube at a faster rate then her buds using Verizon cellular network.
And when it comes to 3G she can surf the web with an iPhone or use Google's own map app while talking on the telephone. That can never happen on any Verizon phone which is a one shot pony, it is either or with Verizon.
What is a real scream is that once Verizon suckers in all the gullible with their ads and a fancy looking Droid Smart Phone customers are going to find that Verizon has just increased their early contract termination agreement to $350 effective Nov 16, 2009. A least Verizon will cut down on customer churn with that penalty!
Then when people realize they have a sluggish touch screen phone that does not have an iPhone like GUI with "Pinch and Spread" for zoom in any of the core apps there is going to be hell to pay.
They could have had a much better experience with the iPhone on that other network. As a matter of fact for all practical purposed where people use a iPhone when out there is often a Wi-Fi hot spot that the iPhone is programmed to seamlessly jump on for a faster data experience. 3G is a non issue when Edge does the job in the few places there is no Wi-Fi.
Sounds like he has been burned by his buddy Bernie Madoff and wants everyone else to chip in for the money that vanished. I plan to boycott any paid content controlled by Ruppert Murdock.
What gets me is that they are eroding storage space... The Zune page is being sucky right now...
But what happened to being able to store a shit-ton of music?
Didn't there used to be a market for this? Where did it go? How many 80Gb+ players still exist? Did people suddenly all delete their music libraries?
<quote><p> But what happened to being able to store a shit-ton of music?</p><p>Didn't there used to be a market for this? Where did it go? How many 80Gb+ players still exist? Did people suddenly all delete their music libraries?</p></quote>
Well consider this how much time do you have? Look at the summary in iTunes of how long you would need to watch all the video, play all the music, podcasts and audio books that is on your typical 16GB iPhone. Mine is weeks at 24x7! I do not listen to a fraction of what I am carrying. If I want something I do not have I can stream it using Pandora or some similar application. You can even easily stream video over the 3G network if you live in Atlanta GA where it is very good.
Use smart playlists in the iTunes program to command the device to change everything on a sync by moving old content off and shuffling new content onto so it is always fresh.
The complete combination of iTunes software [which is better than ever with version 9], the Apple one stop store, and an incredible device itself which is so easy to use makes the Apple Touch and iPhone a runaway leader in their respective classes. Zune is so far back it can't be even seen by normal people. I would never recommend someone waste a few dollars on a Zune just to 'be different'. It just marks them as being dumb!
Not sure why, it is a terrible games platform (judging by my iphone); no controller, and uses up juice way too fast.
Actually I play a game that lasts for hours on the iPhone 3GS and OS 3.1. Most of the time I leave it plugged in to keep the battery fresh, but if I want to continue in the bathroom or in bed I merely unplug it for several more hours of use. I let it get down past 10% with no problems.
The game?
Civ Rev, a variation of my all time favorite Civilization by Sid Myers. Oh, I also take phone calls, play my own music etc all at the same time. It multitasks the things I want to do, including alerting me to local police activity using Trapster while it is doing all of the above. BTW I have 347 applications on that thing, many of them games or simulators. There is a bunch of heavy duty applications for real work too. an you do that on any similar platform as well as the Apple one? Microsoft's Zune isn't even close but more of a joke in my book!
I'm sorry but having an app store and causing problems for some developers beats having no app store at all.
Note: I think iTunes 9's focus on improving the app sync and letting you layout your iPod Touch/iPhones screens speaks volumes about how successful the app store has been.
Actually there are now two app stores for the Touch and iPhone. A rebel, Erica, has figured out a way to digitally sign apps after you route iTunes to look first at his app store then if not found to rollover to Apple's official app store. All in all I think that is an interesting development from the jail break community who were initially nailed with new digital certificates with OS 3.1. Now [in theory] you can load any 'Apple" firmware and jail break programs on your Apple device with a simple edit of your hosts file and iTunes 9.
.
My Daddy was a cop. He always told us all, if you are going to steal, steal big, the penalty is about the same.
Good ole Bernie proved this to be true, didn't he.
Has anyone ever scored more than he did? He scored big for what, few short years in jail before he dies? All those years living large probably filled him with enough memories to last several life times. Wouldn't those memories make Bernie's time a lot easier to do than the time given to urban ghetto punks like these.
Guess what you do not have that plan any more as of September 2009. AT&T should have notified you in your phone bill that you are going to the exact same data plan and cost as the iPhone. The only exception to this is the BlackBerry which is on a more costly plan.
So AT&T has leveled the playing field a lot and added one more reason to go ahead with an iPhone instead of trying to skirt the monthly cost issue. BTW I like the low cost compared to playing big bucks up front for an unlocked phone as I have done in years pass. All those POS have dropped in value within a short period of time. I just sold a broken iPhone 3G for the exact same cash as buying a brand new 3GS. I met the buyer at the AT&T store and when he handed me the cash I handed it to AT&T and said I wanted a new 3GS if this cash was any any good. So far I have sold two iPhones and have not lost a bit on either over the last year.
They are paying to play the same game as everyone else, and deserve the right to do what they want with their time. Denying you the right to play the game as you see fit, and do with your time as you see fit, is really no different than some of the DRM schemes we see and complain about daily here on/.
No one has the right to screw up the game for others. Legitimate players have the right to demand that these people with a personailty and social defect be banned.
My wife will come in an occasionally to wipe off my desk leaving a lite film of water behind. A Logtech wireless mouse doesn't work properly on that until I dry the desk off. Also if she brings me a beer or an ice tea that is so cold condensation will form and spread from the mug across part of the desk so that the mouse skips or flakes out.
This new mouse looks like it will not be susceptible to that sort of problem so I would buy one as soon as it is available in Atlanta.
Slashdot Mirror
The 10 years when WinMo was a major player was characterized by NO consumer choice after the original purchase. Blackberry and Palm were the same way. Now the consumer is beginning to understand the benefits of having an open platform untied to their carrier. So if Android phones get locked down to the same level that WinMo, Palm, and Blackberries where for years then it will have to compete on crutches with the iPhone. Sure there are unlocked phones available but not enough to justify a vibrant marketplace al la iTunes.
How is the 'Droid' not locked down to Verizon? You can not move a Verizon Droid to Sprint another CDMA carrier can you? Can you sell it to anyone elsewhere in the world for use? What will a Droid be worth in two years to anyone? Some are anxious about what a Droid will be worth in six months with all the better Google phones in development. People can sell used iPhones two years old overseas for the same amount of money they paid for them when new. Isn't that what you would call a vibrant marketplace? I have gone through four or five iPhones and my cost has been almost nil except for the normal carrier monthly charge everyone faces.
The other thing you've done is probably continued to pay them in the form of apps or possibly music. In fact, Apple is very interested in keeping you happy since they have alternate revenue streams (in addition to buying a new phone).
Mobile carriers are only interested in getting you to pay them as much per month as possible... Hence disabling most functionality of the phone unless you pay extra "service fees" to access those functions. My own case: Verizon only allows applications in a token way... If I get a new phone, I have to buy the apps that I want all over again if I get them out of their store.
Most other device makers are more interested in getting you to buy the newest toy. Which is why they aren't too keen on keeping them updated, or even working after you've paid for it.
Why do so few see that is why the Apple iPhone is hands down a far better experience for the user? They do not care if you buy the latest toy. They keep improving the iPhone you have already bought with free software updates. You are not captive to any one carrier rolling out an approved update for the iPhone as updates are instantly available through iTunes when the iPhone is connected. iTunes even remembers to periodically double check for you to make sure everything is updated and you didn't miss anything. iTunes even updates 1 to hundreds of apps a day automatically when you sync. Look at the pain everyone else experiences trying to keep everything updated if it is even possible on their phone. If several people spot a fixable iPhone problem with your current hardware, Apple fixes it fairly quickly and rolls out an instant update sometimes many times during the year. There is no long wait as seen with the other vendors and manufacturers. If you buy and new model iPhone ir iPod all your purchases are transferred to the new device at no charge. If you kept the old one too, Apple doesn't care, you can use the software on both purchases at no extra charge. Everything about Apple is in reality a better experience for the majority of the population compared to the alternatives.
Geothermal Project in California Is Shut Down By JAMES GLANZ Published: December 11, 2009 The company in charge of a California project to extract vast amounts of renewable energy from deep, hot bedrock has removed its drill rig and informed federal officials that the government project will be abandoned. AltaRock Energy has told the Department of Energy it has removed its drill rig, shown above in May, from a Northern California site and abandoned the project. A method of tapping energy from bedrock has been linked to increased earthquake activity. The project by the company, AltaRock Energy, was the Obama administration’s first major test of geothermal energy as a significant alternative to fossil fuels and the project was being financed with federal Department of Energy money at a site about 100 miles north of San Francisco called the Geysers. But on Friday, the Energy Department said that AltaRock had given notice this week that “it will not be continuing work at the Geysers”.
The original app store for the Android is pretty poor.
Next year I imagine you'll get Android handsets for less than £100 on Pay-As-You-Go contracts. Once handsets at that kind of price start appearing, the user base will *explode*.
NEXT YEAR?
The Droid has today seen a price cut to $149 on Amazon and $119 at the Dell Store. That huge price cut is just three weeks after it's release.
Why do that if anyone is lining up to buy one?
CNN Tech article on developing for Android: http://www.cnn.com/2009/TECH/11/17/android.wired/index.html Will developers get stuck building for the "least common denominator" of 'droid phones? Or develop for specific models / versions / capabilities? Throw in phone vendor and carrier OS customizations and the Android app marketplace could get hard to live with...
It has already happened to small developers who find they are overwhelmed by twelve different Android phones already. Their applications have to be tweaked for each one.
No one says what will happen when Google, the carrier, or the vendor changes the firmware with an update for anyone phone. It has become a developer's nightmare.
The thing most hurting the Android store is piracy. Period. Even worse, many users, for the cost of $0.99, of which .60 went to the developer, demand $20k/year level support and if they don't get it, bad mouth the hell out of the developer and the application. Hell, most of the time users just leave shitty comments on the market .
This means the only rescue for Android is to lock down the platform - not likely - or for people the kick, every pirate they know, in the nuts for destroying what was to be the an excellent mobile platform. I already know two developers how have been forced to leave the platform. A third isn't far away. Simply put - pirates suck.
BINGO
This what I have already observed. It is too easy to pirate Android software, so who is going to invest time and money developing anything really good for Android?
If there isn't the same quality and quantity found with Apple then no reasonable informed person will waste their money for an inferior experience.
They would be better off buying a shirt pocket iPod Touch with WiFi and a cheap phone without the huge monthly expense of the Androids.
If people saw their phones as personal computers, Android's model would be more successful. However, it doesn't seem to fit in with how most people use their phones. It will find purchase among the small segment of the market that enjoys endlessly tinkering with their gadgets, or philosophically oppose closed designs enough to forgo the iPhone, but the majority of the population will continue to flock to the iPhone.
Those who have a mindset to choose one of the many different variations of Android are enthralled with the idea of getting something for free. To make real money on that platform you would have to serve a lot of click advertising which mars the user experience. Google has already decided that is where their money is and some ads now appear on the home screen of the new Droid.
These are the exact same ones who if they owned an iPhone would be pirating all the games' they could instead of actually purchasing them. That pretty much means you are not going to make any money developing a game for the Android. It also would indicate there will be an even stronger pirate community that will rapidly develop around Android to the dismay of legitimate developers.
Second if you look at the free GPS app that Google had for the Android and compare it to the GPS aps on the iPhone you will discover an interesting flaw. GPS apps that do not store their map data on the handset like a normal PND are not very good when you loose a cellular signal or have a weak one in the boonies. This is the type of app Google has. It is blown away by the dedicated GPS apps available on the iPhone that store their map data on the iPhone which are far faster and more responsive.
But the sheer fact that Google gives away a GPS map precludes any reasonable PND vendor from even bothering to port their GPS app to an Android as they would be competing with FREE by the OS vendor. The awkward Android OS rules for storing data on a Gphone do not help either.
I see no future in Android when compared to an iPhone. It will be just another open source project like Linux that will be hard to monetize.
Think it through. Verizon churn is up with the cream of their customers switching to AT&T and the iPhone. You raise the EFT to incredible levels to discourage people from leaving. It stops future churn. You sneak the ETF in on existing customers by having them make some minor change to their contract, they do not realize they are locked in at the new ETF. It stops future churn. You run misleading ads designed to instill fear in your customers that the iPhone network is very poor and they will not have any phone service. It stops future churn. You get an exclusive on some piece of hardware and promote it as the best thing since sliced bread and only on the Verizon network. It stops current churn, especially by adding the $350 ETF once the customer signs. It is all a clever scheme to deal with an evolving Verizon problem, many of their best customers are willing to change networks just to get an iPhone. They must be stopped by any means.
They then said, I'd have to pay $350. They consider family plans two seperate lines. I'd pay $175 each. Funny how it is two lines for cancellation purposes, but one plan as far as getting new phones. The weird part is that I was convinced my cancellation fee was $150 when I signed the contract.
They explained that all prices and fees can be changed at any time during the contract, and that raised my cancellation fee over the life of the contract. I was pretty livid. I ended up waiting a few months and then jumping to AT&T. Now I have a phone that doesn't get signal in half the town, but I never want to go back to Verizon's service again.
Wow, did anyone else get that. With the new ETF at $350, if you have a family plan you are out a minim of $700 or $1050 (if three phones are on the Verizon family plan). These new fees are a killer if a family breadwinner looses a job and they have to cut back. The way Verizon structures it they will think a long time before the drop Verizon cellular. They may drop cable, internet and more before they bite the bullet and drop Verizon.
Motorola already sells a better version of the Droid in Europe.
The one Verizon has is a first generation model developed exclusively for Verizon. I think it is funny that Verizon is so worried about future churn from those who sign up for Droid that they had to double the early termination fee to hold onto these customers.
<quote>
<p>Learn the lesson: You can't trust the greedy to run critical infrastructure.</p></quote>
What am I missing?
Don't we currently trust them to run the nation's cellular networks?
The people who are the heaviest users and the most dissatisfied with the service will pretty quickly cough up the ETF and switch to the first competitor that offers it. After a few months, this alone may very well have a noticeable effect on network performance.
More importantly, though, as AT&T actually begins to feel the financial effects of fleeing iPhone users, they're going to have no choice but to ramp up the infrastructure upgrades to compete. In other words, the market will actually start working like it's supposed to.
How do you explain Verizon's switch to a heft $350 ETF for Droid and BlackBerry users on Nov 16? It looks to me like they fear new offerings on AT&T will continue to draw the cream of their user base. There are only a handful of users who have bought droid as of today but to read the posts on Gizmodo they have already discovered a lot of pain compared to the AT&T iPhone. No one seems really thought through what they were going to give up by picking up a Droid.
The funniest Gizmodo recommendation was for Droid users to also buy a Zune in order to do video and TV if that is what they want. This sort of discovery causes dissatisfied people to want to immediately get rid of their new high tech toy.
You do realize that snow and sap in trees affect all cellular coverage in spite of what the map says?
It is physics.
I can see the difference when traveling these type of routes as the weather and the seasons change. I do not notice it as much in a metro area.
ki4je
<quote><p>I think that the 'Out of Touch' phrasing is accurate in this context</p></quote>
<p>I disagree - they are trying to give people the distinct impression that you won't be able to communicate. The commercial even shows some sad AT&T network girl alone on a bench somewhere while her Verizon network friends are together having fun. Yes there is a speed difference between 3G and Edge, but give me a break... you can still send/receive calls, texts, and still get online.</p></quote>
What is worse, in real life there is Wi-Fi everywhere on a modern campus, so the girl with the iPhone could be surfing YouTube at a faster rate then her buds using Verizon cellular network.
And when it comes to 3G she can surf the web with an iPhone or use Google's own map app while talking on the telephone. That can never happen on any Verizon phone which is a one shot pony, it is either or with Verizon.
Advertising is so misleading!
What is a real scream is that once Verizon suckers in all the gullible with their ads and a fancy looking Droid Smart Phone customers are going to find that Verizon has just increased their early contract termination agreement to $350 effective Nov 16, 2009. A least Verizon will cut down on customer churn with that penalty!
Then when people realize they have a sluggish touch screen phone that does not have an iPhone like GUI with "Pinch and Spread" for zoom in any of the core apps there is going to be hell to pay.
They could have had a much better experience with the iPhone on that other network. As a matter of fact for all practical purposed where people use a iPhone when out there is often a Wi-Fi hot spot that the iPhone is programmed to seamlessly jump on for a faster data experience. 3G is a non issue when Edge does the job in the few places there is no Wi-Fi.
Sounds like he has been burned by his buddy Bernie Madoff and wants everyone else to chip in for the money that vanished. I plan to boycott any paid content controlled by Ruppert Murdock.
<quote><p>And the introduce Chinese Needle Snakes when you're overrun with lizards, yes?</p></quote>
<p>And when you're overrun with Chinese Needle Snakes, introduce more Chinese fast food restaurants.</p></quote>
And then you will be overrun with Chinese!
Two points
GOAT
Muslims and all people from the Caribbean eat goat, so Atlanta should be a great market for goat meat.
KUDZU
The Japanese dug down up to fifty feet to get Kudzu roots to live on after the two nuclear attacks. The kudzu roots survived the attack!
I understand it is similar to eating potato, french fried kudzu anyone?
What gets me is that they are eroding storage space... The Zune page is being sucky right now...
But what happened to being able to store a shit-ton of music?
Didn't there used to be a market for this? Where did it go? How many 80Gb+ players still exist? Did people suddenly all delete their music libraries?
<quote><p> But what happened to being able to store a shit-ton of music?</p><p>Didn't there used to be a market for this? Where did it go? How many 80Gb+ players still exist? Did people suddenly all delete their music libraries?</p></quote>
Well consider this how much time do you have? Look at the summary in iTunes of how long you would need to watch all the video, play all the music, podcasts and audio books that is on your typical 16GB iPhone. Mine is weeks at 24x7! I do not listen to a fraction of what I am carrying. If I want something I do not have I can stream it using Pandora or some similar application. You can even easily stream video over the 3G network if you live in Atlanta GA where it is very good.
Use smart playlists in the iTunes program to command the device to change everything on a sync by moving old content off and shuffling new content onto so it is always fresh.
The complete combination of iTunes software [which is better than ever with version 9], the Apple one stop store, and an incredible device itself which is so easy to use makes the Apple Touch and iPhone a runaway leader in their respective classes. Zune is so far back it can't be even seen by normal people. I would never recommend someone waste a few dollars on a Zune just to 'be different'. It just marks them as being dumb!
Not sure why, it is a terrible games platform (judging by my iphone); no controller, and uses up juice way too fast.
Actually I play a game that lasts for hours on the iPhone 3GS and OS 3.1. Most of the time I leave it plugged in to keep the battery fresh, but if I want to continue in the bathroom or in bed I merely unplug it for several more hours of use. I let it get down past 10% with no problems. The game? Civ Rev, a variation of my all time favorite Civilization by Sid Myers. Oh, I also take phone calls, play my own music etc all at the same time. It multitasks the things I want to do, including alerting me to local police activity using Trapster while it is doing all of the above. BTW I have 347 applications on that thing, many of them games or simulators. There is a bunch of heavy duty applications for real work too. an you do that on any similar platform as well as the Apple one? Microsoft's Zune isn't even close but more of a joke in my book!
I'm sorry but having an app store and causing problems for some developers beats having no app store at all.
Note: I think iTunes 9's focus on improving the app sync and letting you layout your iPod Touch/iPhones screens speaks volumes about how successful the app store has been.
Actually there are now two app stores for the Touch and iPhone. A rebel, Erica, has figured out a way to digitally sign apps after you route iTunes to look first at his app store then if not found to rollover to Apple's official app store. All in all I think that is an interesting development from the jail break community who were initially nailed with new digital certificates with OS 3.1. Now [in theory] you can load any 'Apple" firmware and jail break programs on your Apple device with a simple edit of your hosts file and iTunes 9. .
My Daddy was a cop. He always told us all, if you are going to steal, steal big, the penalty is about the same.
Good ole Bernie proved this to be true, didn't he. Has anyone ever scored more than he did? He scored big for what, few short years in jail before he dies? All those years living large probably filled him with enough memories to last several life times. Wouldn't those memories make Bernie's time a lot easier to do than the time given to urban ghetto punks like these.
Guess what you do not have that plan any more as of September 2009. AT&T should have notified you in your phone bill that you are going to the exact same data plan and cost as the iPhone. The only exception to this is the BlackBerry which is on a more costly plan. So AT&T has leveled the playing field a lot and added one more reason to go ahead with an iPhone instead of trying to skirt the monthly cost issue. BTW I like the low cost compared to playing big bucks up front for an unlocked phone as I have done in years pass. All those POS have dropped in value within a short period of time. I just sold a broken iPhone 3G for the exact same cash as buying a brand new 3GS. I met the buyer at the AT&T store and when he handed me the cash I handed it to AT&T and said I wanted a new 3GS if this cash was any any good. So far I have sold two iPhones and have not lost a bit on either over the last year.
They are paying to play the same game as everyone else, and deserve the right to do what they want with their time. Denying you the right to play the game as you see fit, and do with your time as you see fit, is really no different than some of the DRM schemes we see and complain about daily here on /.
No one has the right to screw up the game for others. Legitimate players have the right to demand that these people with a personailty and social defect be banned.
My wife will come in an occasionally to wipe off my desk leaving a lite film of water behind. A Logtech wireless mouse doesn't work properly on that until I dry the desk off. Also if she brings me a beer or an ice tea that is so cold condensation will form and spread from the mug across part of the desk so that the mouse skips or flakes out. This new mouse looks like it will not be susceptible to that sort of problem so I would buy one as soon as it is available in Atlanta.