Android isn't all happy and open-platform either. You will be prevented from doing some cool things that your phone is truly capable of, but those restrictions are probably imposed by the carrier and not necessarily the hardware/OS manufacturers. Fortunately it's somewhat easy to obtain root permissions, in which case YOU own your phone and can really do whatever you want.
And so does Sony AND Nintendo. I am of course talking about game consoles. Closed platforms where the owner of the platform (not you dear consumer sheep) decides what gets to run on it.
It's not just software but hardware too! If you've ever lost a Nintendo DS charger, you'll know what I'm talking about... Why do they need a proprietary connector for a charger?
If you want to get really tin-foily, one of the previous messages from this station was:
"75-59-75-59. 39-52-53-58. 5-5-2-5. Konstantin-1-9-0-9-0-8-9-8-Tatiana-Oksana-Anna-Elena-Pavel-Schuka. Konstantin 8-4. 9-7-5-5-9-Tatiana. Anna Larisa Uliyana-9-4-1-4-3-4-8."
75.59W 39.52/53/58E are along the coast of Delaware. 75.59E is near the Kyrgyzstan/China border...
The paper money depreciates over time ONLY if the available supply of printed paper increases. Tons of cash is being printed as we speak, however it's not getting into the hands of Joe Consumer, it's going to the banks to clean up their balance sheets and make them appear solvent, among other places. Standard theories based on history don't always hold true. Hyper-printing currency doesn't immediately lead to hyper-inflation.
I like games that look pixelated and music that sounds computerized, better than the hyper-realistic "head-splattering video overlaid with a 500-piece orchestra" games that exist today. The less realistic the game (think Space Channel 5), the more I like it.
I tend to focus on gameplay more than anything else, and as a result there are tons of NES and SNES titles that I keep going back to. What thrills me the most now is that I can fit hundreds of games and the emulators on a 256MB memory stick, rather than dealing with bulky cartridges that don't even work half the time.
The PS2 is another favorite platform for me because there are a handful of games that I absolutely love. The PS2 also seemed to be the console that opened the door for a million first-person-perspective 3D games that are essentially the same game with different characters and story lines.
Suppose I'm trying to destroy the RFID chip on my credit card. Won't that nifty homebrew device also destroy the info coded on my magnetic stripe, rendering the card nearly useless?
I recently took a trip from Rome to Florence by rail. While nice and convenient, it cost around $100 USD for two people. Even with gasoline at €1.45 per litre (€5.48 per US gallon, which is $7.03 USD per US gallon, almost three times what I pay in the USA) and tolls, it's still cheaper to drive and I have the convenience of going on my schedule.
I didn't factor in the cost of the vehicle (purchase price, insurance, maintenance, etc.), however assuming you already own a car, you're pretty much just paying for fuel/tolls. Now the train still gets there faster and it's nice to sit back and take a nap instead of having to worry about driving, but it's certainly not more cost effective, especially when you have a family. If you're going to a destination that doesn't have any public transportation, it's nice to have that car.
As much as I'd love to have a nationwide rail network, I just don't think it's going to work, no matter how much money is thrown at it. Trains work great in Europe where there are many large cities that are relatively close together, and even more so if your destination is an urban area with a good metro/underground/subway system. Things are just too spread out in the USA. The Northeast Corridor has the most potential to be a practical solution for rail travel, however even then it seems nobody can get it right. Amtrak's Acela is only 30 minutes shorter than the standard service because they're not allowed to get up to speeds that the trains are capable of. Now if Acela could get up to speed (literally), it might be a better service. Price is another problem. I have an upcoming business trip in DC, and I considered Amtrak to get from NY to DC, but the price is ridiculous. $120-$160 depending on the train. If I drive my own vehicle, I can get there at a fraction of that cost (fuel/tolls) and I can get to all the places I need to go in DC and Virginia that aren't served by the DC Metro.
Regional rail still has the greatest potential. NJ Transit has great rail service that helps get people to work in Manhattan and back, however it could be significantly improved if the trains would run faster.
A friend of mine spent an evening in a Texas jail after a routine traffic stop when it was discovered that there was a warrant for his arrest because of a $50 check he wrote (over a year ago) that bounced. He was charged with a class C misdemeanor.
It was an even bigger surprise when he was denied entry to Canada because of this offense. As far as he knows, he's still not allowed entry into Canada.
It's a good thing Canada has such strict regulations, otherwise their country would be overwhelmed with these violent check-bouncing criminals.
I have a FM tuner in my android-based smartphone. I don't use it because I rarely listen to FM radio anymore. I can't find enough stations with programming that I enjoy, and there are too many annoying commercials. Why bother with that when I can use Pandora, or buy the songs that I like in MP3 format?
Another big problem, for me at least, is that the NYC radio market is absolute garbage if you don't listen to mainstream top-40 crap, hip-hop, or Spanish (Latin American) music.
Fortunately there are two awesome alternatives that I do listen to regularly when I'm in my car. The best station (and only station that plays modern rock/metal) is a college station that's commercial free, and the next best thing also happens to be a college radio station (I didn't know this; just found out now when searching the link!).
What about the apps that are locked and won't let you remove them?
I'm referring to the Sprint NFL app, Sprint TV app, Sprint NASCAR app, HTC Footprints, and Amazon MP3 store app on my HTC EVO.
I don't want these apps, I don't need them, and I should be allowed to get rid of them on this "OPEN PLATFORM" Android device, but I can't until Froyo is rootable. Maybe I could live with them if they didn't do anything, but they seem to be constantly starting on their own even when I don't initiate anything; I stop the processes, and they start again shortly afterward. I don't even know if they're sending data, but I'm guessing they are.
I wonder how likely or possible it is to bundle malware with some of these custom ROMs. Just because a ROM is popular and has a dedicated following doesn't mean the author didn't include a hidden process that's collecting tons of personal data. Should I take the tinfoil hat off now, or is this a realistic possibility?
The problem in NYC is that if a restaurant cuts their free wifi, the chances of you finding another open access point from within the restaurant are pretty good. One of my favorite coffee shops (which sadly is no longer in business) never had free wifi; when I asked about it, their response was, "We don't offer free wifi here, but there are at least 5 open access points from our neighbors that you could connect to."
I was drawn to a Blackberry for a personal phone because of the security. All media gets encrypted on my SD card, so if my phone is ever stolen the data is inaccessible. I have a lock screen, so if someone gets their hands on my phone they can't access my data, and after 10 incorrect password attempts, the phone wipes itself.
I recently upgraded to an Android handset, and was disappointed to see that these features are missing. Even basic password authentication is missing; sure I can turn on a gesture-based lock, but that seems a bit ridiculous. Why can't I just implement a standard numeric lock code? Why do I need a third party application to do this - this is basic security that should be built into the phone.
I'd like some reasons why I should consider any smartphone other than an iPhone or an Android-based phone.
I understand that Nokia makes some excellent hardware, but with the explosion in popularity of Android and iOS, it seems we have two winning platforms here, and it's almost too late for anyone else to catch up. RIM had something good going, but they're losing out big time. I've been on a blackberry for three years and recently switched to the Android platform. Nearly everyone I know is ditching their blackberries for iPhones or Android phones when their contracts are up; nobody is getting excited about the latest and greatest offerings from RIM (despite them still being the best platform for business email and having the best battery life of any smartphone that I've used), WebOS was a flop, and WinMo7 is waaaaay late to the party (the Zune of smartphones).
The way I see it, at this point it's all about iPhone and Android, unless someone else gets really creative. People love apps, and it looks like most developers are focused on these two platforms.
Monitors the traffic of 12 regional Internet service providers? Is there a list posted anywhere? My ISP has a EULA, and there's are a few references to third party providers, but it doesn't seems to mention monitoring or sharing of activity or usage details.
Do they still run hot? I once had a HP laptop (AMD Turion X2, 64-bit Vista), and if I routed the exhaust vent into a shoebox, I could probably bake bread or reheat my pizza. Then I installed a BIOS upgrade and those overheating problems went away. It still ran ridiculously hot, but not as bad as before the upgrade.
I'm on a Dell/Pentium now, and it runs much cooler and the performance is better.
That all depends on what school you're talking about. Most of the top tier universities still remain educational powerhouses, teaching students new skills and how to think. The problem I've seen is that there so many 'new' chop-shop universities popping up that seem to be more concerned with profiting, and cranking out degrees to people who want them just for the sake of having them.
There's a huge difference between company X offering a higher salary, and your current employer's bosses earning 10 times your current salary directly because of the code you developed (despite doing much less work). Negotiating even 25% higher from a competing employer is nothing compared to the amounts that these guys make.
It's easy to argue that the programmer knew the deal up front, and agreed to receive compensation for developing code, but I personally would not feel comfortable knowing that my managers made ten times my salary, when it was mostly my hard work that earned all the money. This is precisely the reason I turned down an offer to work for a hedge fund management firm.
One way to help mitigate this would be to offer the programmers a percentage of the earnings, but life isn't always fair like that and none of the big boys would ever go for that; you don't ever get rich by giving away your money or by being nice to everyone you deal with. If the programmer decides the compensation isn't fair, he could easily leave and I'd bet there are a hundred other willing and qualified programmers to fill his position, probably accepting less than a $150K salary.
My brother worked in an industry that used a similar tactic; he along with about five other people were paid $40K per year to do a bunch of manual work which resulted in well over $2M in profit for the company. When they were promised a percentage of the earnings and never received it after two years, they all left and did the same thing on their own.
Now their only downside is that they didn't have the capital that their previous employer did, and therefore couldn't scale their operation immediately to make $2M profit, however they still did quite well for themselves and things kept growing.
In the case of the HFT programmers, what's to stop them from pulling off a malicious "Office Space" tactic (as mentioned below)?
I downloaded BarcodeScanner for Android, and was a bit surprised to see that it was requesting access to contacts, bookmarks, SD card, and WiFi settings. Fortunately they have a FAQ that addresses this.
For those too lazy to follow the link, this application has the ability to generate a 3d QR barcode of your contacts, bookmarks, and WiFi settings, and also has the ability to read a barcode and store info about it on your SD card.
They provide assurances that the data isn't used maliciously, however the only way for me to confirm that the application is 'safe' would be to review the code myself.
The fact that they publish the code is a good thing and I'm led to assume that it's safe because the code is released and anyone can view it, but I wonder if someone did slip something nasty into a popular application, and still released the source, would anybody really catch it?
I'm still a bit wary of the whole Android Marketplace and I try to be extra cautious because there are no guarantees that what I'm getting is perfectly safe. I just don't see how it's not possible for a popular application to have 200,000 downloads and a five star rating to be safe; couldn't one of these apps just harvest a ton of data anonymously, sending it off to one of their servers?
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Android isn't all happy and open-platform either. You will be prevented from doing some cool things that your phone is truly capable of, but those restrictions are probably imposed by the carrier and not necessarily the hardware/OS manufacturers. Fortunately it's somewhat easy to obtain root permissions, in which case YOU own your phone and can really do whatever you want.
It's not just software but hardware too! If you've ever lost a Nintendo DS charger, you'll know what I'm talking about... Why do they need a proprietary connector for a charger?
75.59W 39.52/53/58E are along the coast of Delaware. 75.59E is near the Kyrgyzstan/China border...
The paper money depreciates over time ONLY if the available supply of printed paper increases. Tons of cash is being printed as we speak, however it's not getting into the hands of Joe Consumer, it's going to the banks to clean up their balance sheets and make them appear solvent, among other places. Standard theories based on history don't always hold true. Hyper-printing currency doesn't immediately lead to hyper-inflation.
I tend to focus on gameplay more than anything else, and as a result there are tons of NES and SNES titles that I keep going back to. What thrills me the most now is that I can fit hundreds of games and the emulators on a 256MB memory stick, rather than dealing with bulky cartridges that don't even work half the time.
The PS2 is another favorite platform for me because there are a handful of games that I absolutely love. The PS2 also seemed to be the console that opened the door for a million first-person-perspective 3D games that are essentially the same game with different characters and story lines.
Suppose I'm trying to destroy the RFID chip on my credit card. Won't that nifty homebrew device also destroy the info coded on my magnetic stripe, rendering the card nearly useless?
Somebody set up us the bomb!
I recently took a trip from Rome to Florence by rail. While nice and convenient, it cost around $100 USD for two people. Even with gasoline at €1.45 per litre (€5.48 per US gallon, which is $7.03 USD per US gallon, almost three times what I pay in the USA) and tolls, it's still cheaper to drive and I have the convenience of going on my schedule.
I didn't factor in the cost of the vehicle (purchase price, insurance, maintenance, etc.), however assuming you already own a car, you're pretty much just paying for fuel/tolls. Now the train still gets there faster and it's nice to sit back and take a nap instead of having to worry about driving, but it's certainly not more cost effective, especially when you have a family. If you're going to a destination that doesn't have any public transportation, it's nice to have that car.
As much as I'd love to have a nationwide rail network, I just don't think it's going to work, no matter how much money is thrown at it. Trains work great in Europe where there are many large cities that are relatively close together, and even more so if your destination is an urban area with a good metro/underground/subway system. Things are just too spread out in the USA. The Northeast Corridor has the most potential to be a practical solution for rail travel, however even then it seems nobody can get it right. Amtrak's Acela is only 30 minutes shorter than the standard service because they're not allowed to get up to speeds that the trains are capable of. Now if Acela could get up to speed (literally), it might be a better service. Price is another problem. I have an upcoming business trip in DC, and I considered Amtrak to get from NY to DC, but the price is ridiculous. $120-$160 depending on the train. If I drive my own vehicle, I can get there at a fraction of that cost (fuel/tolls) and I can get to all the places I need to go in DC and Virginia that aren't served by the DC Metro.
Regional rail still has the greatest potential. NJ Transit has great rail service that helps get people to work in Manhattan and back, however it could be significantly improved if the trains would run faster.
A friend of mine spent an evening in a Texas jail after a routine traffic stop when it was discovered that there was a warrant for his arrest because of a $50 check he wrote (over a year ago) that bounced. He was charged with a class C misdemeanor.
It was an even bigger surprise when he was denied entry to Canada because of this offense. As far as he knows, he's still not allowed entry into Canada.
It's a good thing Canada has such strict regulations, otherwise their country would be overwhelmed with these violent check-bouncing criminals.
Think different. Just like everybody else.
I have a FM tuner in my android-based smartphone. I don't use it because I rarely listen to FM radio anymore. I can't find enough stations with programming that I enjoy, and there are too many annoying commercials. Why bother with that when I can use Pandora, or buy the songs that I like in MP3 format?
Another big problem, for me at least, is that the NYC radio market is absolute garbage if you don't listen to mainstream top-40 crap, hip-hop, or Spanish (Latin American) music. Fortunately there are two awesome alternatives that I do listen to regularly when I'm in my car. The best station (and only station that plays modern rock/metal) is a college station that's commercial free, and the next best thing also happens to be a college radio station (I didn't know this; just found out now when searching the link!).
What about the apps that are locked and won't let you remove them?
I'm referring to the Sprint NFL app, Sprint TV app, Sprint NASCAR app, HTC Footprints, and Amazon MP3 store app on my HTC EVO.
I don't want these apps, I don't need them, and I should be allowed to get rid of them on this "OPEN PLATFORM" Android device, but I can't until Froyo is rootable. Maybe I could live with them if they didn't do anything, but they seem to be constantly starting on their own even when I don't initiate anything; I stop the processes, and they start again shortly afterward. I don't even know if they're sending data, but I'm guessing they are.
I wonder how likely or possible it is to bundle malware with some of these custom ROMs. Just because a ROM is popular and has a dedicated following doesn't mean the author didn't include a hidden process that's collecting tons of personal data. Should I take the tinfoil hat off now, or is this a realistic possibility?
I've always thought SED stood for "Smoke Emitting Diode"
It's my favorite electronic component, but the only problem is that they only work once.
The problem in NYC is that if a restaurant cuts their free wifi, the chances of you finding another open access point from within the restaurant are pretty good. One of my favorite coffee shops (which sadly is no longer in business) never had free wifi; when I asked about it, their response was, "We don't offer free wifi here, but there are at least 5 open access points from our neighbors that you could connect to."
I must be new here.
If that happened, I'd simply connect to my computer and restore a backup - I do those periodically. Problem solved.
I was drawn to a Blackberry for a personal phone because of the security. All media gets encrypted on my SD card, so if my phone is ever stolen the data is inaccessible. I have a lock screen, so if someone gets their hands on my phone they can't access my data, and after 10 incorrect password attempts, the phone wipes itself.
I recently upgraded to an Android handset, and was disappointed to see that these features are missing. Even basic password authentication is missing; sure I can turn on a gesture-based lock, but that seems a bit ridiculous. Why can't I just implement a standard numeric lock code? Why do I need a third party application to do this - this is basic security that should be built into the phone.
I'd like some reasons why I should consider any smartphone other than an iPhone or an Android-based phone.
I understand that Nokia makes some excellent hardware, but with the explosion in popularity of Android and iOS, it seems we have two winning platforms here, and it's almost too late for anyone else to catch up. RIM had something good going, but they're losing out big time. I've been on a blackberry for three years and recently switched to the Android platform. Nearly everyone I know is ditching their blackberries for iPhones or Android phones when their contracts are up; nobody is getting excited about the latest and greatest offerings from RIM (despite them still being the best platform for business email and having the best battery life of any smartphone that I've used), WebOS was a flop, and WinMo7 is waaaaay late to the party (the Zune of smartphones).
The way I see it, at this point it's all about iPhone and Android, unless someone else gets really creative. People love apps, and it looks like most developers are focused on these two platforms.
I guess we better not tell them about the shuttle bus in Honolulu...
Monitors the traffic of 12 regional Internet service providers? Is there a list posted anywhere? My ISP has a EULA, and there's are a few references to third party providers, but it doesn't seems to mention monitoring or sharing of activity or usage details.
Do they still run hot? I once had a HP laptop (AMD Turion X2, 64-bit Vista), and if I routed the exhaust vent into a shoebox, I could probably bake bread or reheat my pizza. Then I installed a BIOS upgrade and those overheating problems went away. It still ran ridiculously hot, but not as bad as before the upgrade.
I'm on a Dell/Pentium now, and it runs much cooler and the performance is better.
That all depends on what school you're talking about. Most of the top tier universities still remain educational powerhouses, teaching students new skills and how to think. The problem I've seen is that there so many 'new' chop-shop universities popping up that seem to be more concerned with profiting, and cranking out degrees to people who want them just for the sake of having them.
There's a huge difference between company X offering a higher salary, and your current employer's bosses earning 10 times your current salary directly because of the code you developed (despite doing much less work). Negotiating even 25% higher from a competing employer is nothing compared to the amounts that these guys make.
It's easy to argue that the programmer knew the deal up front, and agreed to receive compensation for developing code, but I personally would not feel comfortable knowing that my managers made ten times my salary, when it was mostly my hard work that earned all the money. This is precisely the reason I turned down an offer to work for a hedge fund management firm.
One way to help mitigate this would be to offer the programmers a percentage of the earnings, but life isn't always fair like that and none of the big boys would ever go for that; you don't ever get rich by giving away your money or by being nice to everyone you deal with. If the programmer decides the compensation isn't fair, he could easily leave and I'd bet there are a hundred other willing and qualified programmers to fill his position, probably accepting less than a $150K salary.
My brother worked in an industry that used a similar tactic; he along with about five other people were paid $40K per year to do a bunch of manual work which resulted in well over $2M in profit for the company. When they were promised a percentage of the earnings and never received it after two years, they all left and did the same thing on their own.
Now their only downside is that they didn't have the capital that their previous employer did, and therefore couldn't scale their operation immediately to make $2M profit, however they still did quite well for themselves and things kept growing.
In the case of the HFT programmers, what's to stop them from pulling off a malicious "Office Space" tactic (as mentioned below)?
I downloaded BarcodeScanner for Android, and was a bit surprised to see that it was requesting access to contacts, bookmarks, SD card, and WiFi settings. Fortunately they have a FAQ that addresses this.
For those too lazy to follow the link, this application has the ability to generate a 3d QR barcode of your contacts, bookmarks, and WiFi settings, and also has the ability to read a barcode and store info about it on your SD card.
They provide assurances that the data isn't used maliciously, however the only way for me to confirm that the application is 'safe' would be to review the code myself.
The fact that they publish the code is a good thing and I'm led to assume that it's safe because the code is released and anyone can view it, but I wonder if someone did slip something nasty into a popular application, and still released the source, would anybody really catch it?
I'm still a bit wary of the whole Android Marketplace and I try to be extra cautious because there are no guarantees that what I'm getting is perfectly safe. I just don't see how it's not possible for a popular application to have 200,000 downloads and a five star rating to be safe; couldn't one of these apps just harvest a ton of data anonymously, sending it off to one of their servers?