Actually I've owned the device almost a year, I've been hacking it for about 4 days now. Hadn't seen any need to prior to that. Still don't really see any need to actually, I just got bored...
On the other hand, when I owned an iPod touch, I _always_ had it jailbroken, starting just a couple days after I bought it. Out of necessity. Couldn't do anything that I wanted without it jailbroken. And it took a fair bit of effort to keep it jailbroken.
There's no official way to get the market on them, because they don't meet the hardware requirements entirely. But there are plenty of.apk files floating around for it. It's literally download the file to the device and make two taps, and it's installed. All the apps work fine too as far as I can tell. They do have their own market preinstalled that has a decent amount of apps in it.
Not sure where you can try it, but I can tell you that I _highly_ prefer it's touch screen to the iPhone devices. Mostly because it's resistive. Feels about the same (does take a bit of pressure, obviously), but I can grab any random thing (I've used keys, pencil tips, screwdrivers, etc) as a stylus. Which makes a lot of tasks far easier. That was always my biggest problem with the iPhone screens - damn near impossible to type when the keyboard keys are smaller than the smallest touch it can recognize...
Just like a PC, the ARCHOS 5 Internet Tablet can be freely programmed in alternative ways in addition to the applications that can be created for the Android platform. To have total control of your Internet Tablet, ARCHOS has opened up this device, thus allowing creative minds to program their own tablet, or create what could be the tablet of the future.
I currently have 3 OSes on my Archos - The original Archos software (based on Android 1.6), Angstrom Linux, and Android 2.2. And I can update any of them without having any impact on the other two.
I could go on for pages about how hackable Archos devices are. Every time I try to do something, I'm once again amazed at how simple it is.
Are you a casino employee, or are you actually that fucking stupid?
What the casinos are doing is more like locking a bike to a bike rack and putting a note saying "If you can open the chain, the bike is yours." and then calling the cops when someone cuts the lock instead of guessing the combination.
I'm assuming you mean "lower resolution" display, not touch, correct? The display seems brilliant as far as I'm concerned (seems just as high quality as any iPod or iPhone I've ever seen), and the touch....I can tap with the tip of a pin and it'll get the exact spot I wanted. With a capacitive screen you're lucky if you can use anything smaller than a square centimeter. That's one of the main reasons I hated the iPod touch - it was too difficult to type, when the keyboard keys were smaller than the minimum size the touch screen could register. After going from an iPod touch to an Archos 5 IT, I will _NEVER_ go back to a capacitive touch screen. I love that I can just grab anything nearby (usually the back of a pencil) and use it as a stylus.
It doesn't connect to the Android Marketplace for apps.
Mine has the Android market on it. You do have to download it separately, but once you do that it's literally three clicks on the device to install it. Quite simple.
They're not built in any quantity so are always "Out of Stock"
Really? I had no trouble at all getting mine. And if you can't get it from Archos directly - go to Amazon or any of the hundreds of other stores selling them. Seriously, I even know local brick and mortar stores that keep them in stock.
it's basically the same price as the iPod Touch
Yes, for a _far_ better device. What's your point?
The Archos 5IT has GPS, actually....though it's not very good unless you get the GPS attachment (which has a better antenna) And yea, they don't have the android market pre-installed, but it's quite easy to add it, and everything works fine.
Air travel will become significantly more expensive. Cars might cost a bit more. Shipping prices will increase. But by and large, everything will keep on moving.
Seriously, diesel engines, when they were first designed, weren't made to run on oil. I believe the first diesel engine ever demonstrated ran on peanut oil. And some of the first automobiles ever designed were electric. Do you _seriously_ think we'll lose more than a century worth of technology just because we run out of oil? We don't _need_ oil to build anything. There are plenty of aircraft that can fly without oil. There are plenty of plastics based on plant polymers. There are plenty of cars that can run on electricity - and most of our existing ones could be retrofitted to do so. Or, even easier, we could pretty simply retrofit our cars to run on biodiesel. Hell, some older cars can even be run on straight hydrogen with some small modifications.
Sure, things will be more expensive for a while. And yea, none of these are a _perfect_ solution, and none of them should be the final solution, but they are all things that we are capable of doing _right now_. It's not like all of the world's oil is going to cease to exist tomorrow. We'll have some time to shift away while the prices skyrocket. It's not going to be easy, it will certainly hurt a lot of people without proper support, but we're certainly not going to lose a century worth of technological progress because of it.
They never targeted the public facing website for Paypal. It was the ssh port and the api site that they went after. They weren't targeting your ability to visit Paypal.com, they were directly targeting the ability to make a payment.
And if you don't act within 2 days (my bank doesn't send emails for every transaction - it's all online, but it's not like I login every day, or even use my card every day), it's $50 vs. $500 max liability. Yea, I'll stick with credit. Unless I got pretty lucky, odds are very slim that I would notice fraudulent activity within two days.
Debit systems over here do _NOT_ use Visa/Mastercard. What you're seeing is the fact that most debit cards _also_ work as Visa or Mastercard credit cards. When I do a transaction, the clerk asks 'debit or credit?' - if I choose credit, it goes through Visa's system, and comes out of my checking account. If I choose 'debit', it goes through the Star system and comes out of my checking account. Star is the leading debit network: http://www.star.com/about/
However, most people usually just run it as credit - and there's a good reason for that. If someone steals your card info for a debit card - you're pretty much screwed. Any money they pull out before you notice is _gone_ unless you report it pretty much immediately - and even then, that's no guarantee you'll get it back. I think they have a maximum amount they'll refund, and they'll only refund that if you notify them within 30 days. With Visa - they'll refund everything. And I don't recall there being any significant time limit on it. So yea, I usually run my transactions through the Visa system too whenever possible, because it's safer.
So far there hasn't been anything really damning about them, except the fact that diplomatic relationships are now shattered across the world.
Wait. The fact that we had a bunch of agents who illegally abducted, abused, even tortured an innocent man from Germany - and our Government knew this, and former Secretary of State Rice was involved in forcing the German government to withdraw prosecution against the agents involved in this....that isn't damning? That doesn't matter at all?
Your reasoning error is to assume that because there is no "regulation" preventing them from running away with everyone's money, that it must mean they're somehow going to do so.
They do. I mean not _everybody's_ money, and not all at once, but they've demonstrated many times in the past that they have absolutely no problem with initiating fraudulent charges and outright hijacking accounts.
Both women boasted of their of their respective celebrity conquests on internet posts and mobile phones texts after the intimacy they would now see him destroyed for.
Ardin hosted a party in Assange’s honour at her flat after the ‘crime’ and tweeted to her followers that she was with the “the world's coolest smartest people, it's amazing!”
They show that the highest levels of our government (Secretary of State) were actively aware and involved in knowingly kidnapping, toturing, and otherwise abusing a man they _knew_ to be innocent. That is not newsworthy? That is something we didn't already know about. I mean, we knew it happened, but we didn't know how far up it went.
Try going through a similar amount of school, with student loans and such as well, and after having 30 years of experience in the field and being one of the best in the state at what you do, still having a salary of around $50k a year.
In other words, try being a social security attorney.
I already counted the electives. They're part of that 126 credits. I get 3 of them I think. Unless I want to be taking 20 credits per semester just for the hell of it. Which I certainly don't have time for. But I do other things though - I'm currently holding 11 officer positions in various student groups, so that helps...I've learned more about programming and IT work in general from being involved with Amnesty International than I have from any of my classes....
It's college. You pick your classes. You also pick your college. So if your education doesn't seem worth it perhaps the school isn't the problem.
Really? Out of 126 credits that I'm required to take, only about 40 of them were things I was allowed to select. And 18 of those had to be outside of my major (art classes, humanities classes, etc - things I'm not incredibly interested in as a Comp Sci major). Then I had to take some health/phys ed credits. When it comes down to it, I think there are maybe 12 or 15 credits of classes that I'm taking because I actually kinda want to take them (even those, I only had about 15 classes to choose from - there are a couple I scheduled that I"m not really interested in). Not that I haven't enjoyed some of the required courses, but I'm still, in my Junior year, re-taking classes on crap that I learned _IN HIGHSCHOOL_. Because I have to. Because I need that piece of paper to get past the HR departments. Honestly, I could have learned a _lot_ more on my own in these past three years. I learn more over the summer and over breaks than I generally do over the entire school year....taking assembly language for the second time, or my fourth introductory Java class. Or "learning" the crap that I taught myself in 7th grade.
There are very, _very_ few posts here saying that what he did is _morally_ wrong. What they're saying is that it's pretty blatant copy and is, therefore, illegal. Yes, this game should be legal, but it's a pretty blatant Pac-Man ripoff. Not even the slightest attempt to change the game really. So based on our current laws, I don't think there's any way he can reasonably claim he didn't do anything illegal. (But of course, IANAL.)
Of course, there have been one or two posts saying it is morally wrong, based on the premise that he is trying to make a quick buck from a blatant ripoff of someone else's game. Which is a legitimate complaint, but I would imagine that everyone who buys it knows that's the case, and he does deserve some credit for bringing it to a new platform. If he was trying to pass it off as an original idea, then there'd be a problem.
Uninstall Symantec? Last time I tried that...it refused. The uninstaller says it can't uninstall while it's running. But there's no 'exit' button on it. You try through CTRL-ALT-DEL and it just pops back up. Even if you can manage to get the entire process killed, the installer still usually gives you something along the lines of "I'm sorry Dave, I can't do that."....even in Safe Mode it won't let you remove it! I generally end up booting a Linux LiveCD and just wiping whatever Norton files I can find...only then will the uninstaller usually cooperate and clean up the rest of it.
Has anyone ever had a controlled experiment where having the full paid for version of Symantec or AVG actually provided more security than their free counterparts?
No, but I have had plenty of experiences where they (almost exclusively Symantec actually) cause a hell of a lot of problems on their own - and missed some rather nasty viruses. Disinfecting a computer that already has Norton installed is _not_ fun. Because Norton won't let you remove it, and it seems to do battle with any alternate antivirus you install. I've seen computers slowed to the point where it takes a good 5-10 minutes to move the mouse over and click the 'start' button because they accidentally had Norton and another AV installed. Not really sure why this happens either - I've seen other combinations installed without any problems. Still not a great idea, but you'd be amazed how many clueless users (and sysadmins....) hear their business offering free AV, and get that installed...when their computer already came with AV installed...and then they see a free AV mentioned online a bit later, forget that they already have _two_, and install that one too. Worst part is that usually they have someone else (who should know better) install it for them. And as mentioned, if one of those AV apps happens to be Norton, that's gonna slow it down and be harder to remove than any virus I've ever seen.
I still to this day do not know how to uninstall Norton. You try the uninstaller, and it flat-out _refuses_. Try through control panel, same thing. I usually end up booting up a Linux LiveCD and just deleting a few critical files so that it can't start up anymore...then the installer will generally run.
They can't kill anyone or have anyone killed. They can't drive drunk. No, all they have is "bigger" toys, but the POWER that comes with riches is gone - reserved by governments only.
You sure about that? They can buy off the cops and judges. And hell, even if they do get caught, they can afford the best lawyers in the country. Even if they don't get away with it entirely, they're going to get a _far_ lighter sentence than anyone else who committed the exact same crime. My father got a DUI and was given a far harsher sentence than a _17 year old_ rich kid I knew who had one. What was that kid's punishment? His highschool said they were going to withhold his diploma for a while. They never did. Yes, it was the city police that caught him, and the only even _threat_ of punishment came from his highschool. Meanwhile, the average adult who gets a DUI (doesn't even have the added crime of underage drinking) gets a huge fine, possibly jailtime, and a breathalyzer on their car for a while. Oh, and let's not forget that a $100,000 fine means a lot more to someone if it's 2 years wages compared to someone for whom it's one month's salary.
Nowadays the "ultra rich" may be able to afford many homes and travel often. But unless they fly out of non commercial terminals, they still have to stand in the TSA line line everyone else.
...Unless they're a government or airline official. But that point aside, a _lot_ of people have or rent private jets. I wouldn't quite say it's only the "ultra rich" - there are hundreds of families in Pittsburgh alone that can afford such things. I know one that rents a jet every year for their family vacation. Within the richest 1%, sure - but that's still 1 out of every 100 people.
So yeah, there might be more zeroes at the end of the net worth of rich people than there were before, but considering that "poor" people and "middle class" people usually have shelter, television, transport (private or public), food, etc, it's actually the poor who are better off than ever before.
Yea, while being thousands of dollars in debt for it - something that wasn't always possible, and certainly not as prevalent, in previous generations.
Sony didn't need bailouts for the PS3, which took several years to become profitable...
If you're a big enough company, you can sell your newest products at a loss for a while. Although I'm not sure where GM plans to make up the cost...as PS3 was obviously getting it back in games and accessories...GM probably gets some from accessories, parts, service, etc, but I can't imagine it's that much. But then again, if the losses aren't _that_ big, it could just be worth it for the good PR for a while. And for being one of the first out there. I'd say the Volt is probably the best electric car on the market right now, and building that kind of a brand will be better than any advertising campaign in 10 years or so.
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Actually I've owned the device almost a year, I've been hacking it for about 4 days now. Hadn't seen any need to prior to that. Still don't really see any need to actually, I just got bored...
On the other hand, when I owned an iPod touch, I _always_ had it jailbroken, starting just a couple days after I bought it. Out of necessity. Couldn't do anything that I wanted without it jailbroken. And it took a fair bit of effort to keep it jailbroken.
There's no official way to get the market on them, because they don't meet the hardware requirements entirely. But there are plenty of .apk files floating around for it. It's literally download the file to the device and make two taps, and it's installed. All the apps work fine too as far as I can tell. They do have their own market preinstalled that has a decent amount of apps in it.
Not sure where you can try it, but I can tell you that I _highly_ prefer it's touch screen to the iPhone devices. Mostly because it's resistive. Feels about the same (does take a bit of pressure, obviously), but I can grab any random thing (I've used keys, pencil tips, screwdrivers, etc) as a stylus. Which makes a lot of tasks far easier. That was always my biggest problem with the iPhone screens - damn near impossible to type when the keyboard keys are smaller than the smallest touch it can recognize...
Then you can make keeping the tablet customized and updated and flashed and jailbroken your new personal hobby for a few years.
Or you could buy from a decent company that dosen't think it owns your soul because you purchased one of their products.
http://www.archos.com/products/ta/archos_5it/dualos.html
Just like a PC, the ARCHOS 5 Internet Tablet can be freely programmed in alternative ways in addition to the applications that can be created for the Android platform. To have total control of your Internet Tablet, ARCHOS has opened up this device, thus allowing creative minds to program their own tablet, or create what could be the tablet of the future.
I currently have 3 OSes on my Archos - The original Archos software (based on Android 1.6), Angstrom Linux, and Android 2.2. And I can update any of them without having any impact on the other two.
I could go on for pages about how hackable Archos devices are. Every time I try to do something, I'm once again amazed at how simple it is.
Are you a casino employee, or are you actually that fucking stupid?
What the casinos are doing is more like locking a bike to a bike rack and putting a note saying "If you can open the chain, the bike is yours." and then calling the cops when someone cuts the lock instead of guessing the combination.
I'm assuming you mean "lower resolution" display, not touch, correct? The display seems brilliant as far as I'm concerned (seems just as high quality as any iPod or iPhone I've ever seen), and the touch....I can tap with the tip of a pin and it'll get the exact spot I wanted. With a capacitive screen you're lucky if you can use anything smaller than a square centimeter. That's one of the main reasons I hated the iPod touch - it was too difficult to type, when the keyboard keys were smaller than the minimum size the touch screen could register. After going from an iPod touch to an Archos 5 IT, I will _NEVER_ go back to a capacitive touch screen. I love that I can just grab anything nearby (usually the back of a pencil) and use it as a stylus.
It doesn't connect to the Android Marketplace for apps.
Mine has the Android market on it. You do have to download it separately, but once you do that it's literally three clicks on the device to install it. Quite simple.
They're not built in any quantity so are always "Out of Stock"
Really? I had no trouble at all getting mine. And if you can't get it from Archos directly - go to Amazon or any of the hundreds of other stores selling them. Seriously, I even know local brick and mortar stores that keep them in stock.
it's basically the same price as the iPod Touch
Yes, for a _far_ better device. What's your point?
The Archos 5IT has GPS, actually....though it's not very good unless you get the GPS attachment (which has a better antenna)
And yea, they don't have the android market pre-installed, but it's quite easy to add it, and everything works fine.
Love my Archos 5.
Air travel will become significantly more expensive. Cars might cost a bit more. Shipping prices will increase. But by and large, everything will keep on moving.
Seriously, diesel engines, when they were first designed, weren't made to run on oil. I believe the first diesel engine ever demonstrated ran on peanut oil. And some of the first automobiles ever designed were electric. Do you _seriously_ think we'll lose more than a century worth of technology just because we run out of oil? We don't _need_ oil to build anything. There are plenty of aircraft that can fly without oil. There are plenty of plastics based on plant polymers. There are plenty of cars that can run on electricity - and most of our existing ones could be retrofitted to do so. Or, even easier, we could pretty simply retrofit our cars to run on biodiesel. Hell, some older cars can even be run on straight hydrogen with some small modifications.
Sure, things will be more expensive for a while. And yea, none of these are a _perfect_ solution, and none of them should be the final solution, but they are all things that we are capable of doing _right now_. It's not like all of the world's oil is going to cease to exist tomorrow. We'll have some time to shift away while the prices skyrocket. It's not going to be easy, it will certainly hurt a lot of people without proper support, but we're certainly not going to lose a century worth of technological progress because of it.
They never targeted the public facing website for Paypal. It was the ssh port and the api site that they went after. They weren't targeting your ability to visit Paypal.com, they were directly targeting the ability to make a payment.
And if you don't act within 2 days (my bank doesn't send emails for every transaction - it's all online, but it's not like I login every day, or even use my card every day), it's $50 vs. $500 max liability. Yea, I'll stick with credit. Unless I got pretty lucky, odds are very slim that I would notice fraudulent activity within two days.
Debit systems over here do _NOT_ use Visa/Mastercard. What you're seeing is the fact that most debit cards _also_ work as Visa or Mastercard credit cards. When I do a transaction, the clerk asks 'debit or credit?' - if I choose credit, it goes through Visa's system, and comes out of my checking account. If I choose 'debit', it goes through the Star system and comes out of my checking account. Star is the leading debit network:
http://www.star.com/about/
However, most people usually just run it as credit - and there's a good reason for that. If someone steals your card info for a debit card - you're pretty much screwed. Any money they pull out before you notice is _gone_ unless you report it pretty much immediately - and even then, that's no guarantee you'll get it back. I think they have a maximum amount they'll refund, and they'll only refund that if you notify them within 30 days. With Visa - they'll refund everything. And I don't recall there being any significant time limit on it. So yea, I usually run my transactions through the Visa system too whenever possible, because it's safer.
So far there hasn't been anything really damning about them, except the fact that diplomatic relationships are now shattered across the world.
Wait. The fact that we had a bunch of agents who illegally abducted, abused, even tortured an innocent man from Germany - and our Government knew this, and former Secretary of State Rice was involved in forcing the German government to withdraw prosecution against the agents involved in this....that isn't damning? That doesn't matter at all?
Your reasoning error is to assume that because there is no "regulation" preventing them from running away with everyone's money, that it must mean they're somehow going to do so.
They do. I mean not _everybody's_ money, and not all at once, but they've demonstrated many times in the past that they have absolutely no problem with initiating fraudulent charges and outright hijacking accounts.
So wait...standing up for the rights UPON WHICH THIS NATION WAS FOUNDED makes you an enemy of said nation? Really now?
Try reading the fucking constitution some time. You could learn a lot.
I think it's worth adding that:
Both women boasted of their of their respective celebrity conquests on internet posts and mobile phones texts after the intimacy they would now see him destroyed for.
Ardin hosted a party in Assange’s honour at her flat after the ‘crime’ and tweeted to her followers that she was with the “the world's coolest smartest people, it's amazing!”
source: http://www.heraldsun.com.au/opinion/swedens-reputation-is-on-trial-in-julian-assange-case/story-e6frfhqf-1225965772832
They show that the highest levels of our government (Secretary of State) were actively aware and involved in knowingly kidnapping, toturing, and otherwise abusing a man they _knew_ to be innocent. That is not newsworthy? That is something we didn't already know about. I mean, we knew it happened, but we didn't know how far up it went.
Try going through a similar amount of school, with student loans and such as well, and after having 30 years of experience in the field and being one of the best in the state at what you do, still having a salary of around $50k a year.
In other words, try being a social security attorney.
I already counted the electives. They're part of that 126 credits. I get 3 of them I think. Unless I want to be taking 20 credits per semester just for the hell of it. Which I certainly don't have time for. But I do other things though - I'm currently holding 11 officer positions in various student groups, so that helps...I've learned more about programming and IT work in general from being involved with Amnesty International than I have from any of my classes....
It's college. You pick your classes. You also pick your college. So if your education doesn't seem worth it perhaps the school isn't the problem.
Really? Out of 126 credits that I'm required to take, only about 40 of them were things I was allowed to select. And 18 of those had to be outside of my major (art classes, humanities classes, etc - things I'm not incredibly interested in as a Comp Sci major). Then I had to take some health/phys ed credits. When it comes down to it, I think there are maybe 12 or 15 credits of classes that I'm taking because I actually kinda want to take them (even those, I only had about 15 classes to choose from - there are a couple I scheduled that I"m not really interested in). Not that I haven't enjoyed some of the required courses, but I'm still, in my Junior year, re-taking classes on crap that I learned _IN HIGHSCHOOL_. Because I have to. Because I need that piece of paper to get past the HR departments. Honestly, I could have learned a _lot_ more on my own in these past three years. I learn more over the summer and over breaks than I generally do over the entire school year....taking assembly language for the second time, or my fourth introductory Java class. Or "learning" the crap that I taught myself in 7th grade.
There are very, _very_ few posts here saying that what he did is _morally_ wrong. What they're saying is that it's pretty blatant copy and is, therefore, illegal. Yes, this game should be legal, but it's a pretty blatant Pac-Man ripoff. Not even the slightest attempt to change the game really. So based on our current laws, I don't think there's any way he can reasonably claim he didn't do anything illegal. (But of course, IANAL.)
Of course, there have been one or two posts saying it is morally wrong, based on the premise that he is trying to make a quick buck from a blatant ripoff of someone else's game. Which is a legitimate complaint, but I would imagine that everyone who buys it knows that's the case, and he does deserve some credit for bringing it to a new platform. If he was trying to pass it off as an original idea, then there'd be a problem.
Only 7 cans? Based on my inbox (well, spam folder, gmail filters rock) I'd be getting pallets of that stuff. lol.
Hell, it'd be like cracker jack! Spam with a free prize inside! Viagra, other drugs, fake Rolexes, a kingdom in Nigera....
Just be glad you won't get 'ping' flooded with empty 2 meter capsules, or a 200,000 capsule DDOS attack.
Whatever you do, just don't order any Spam! :)
Uninstall Symantec? Last time I tried that...it refused. The uninstaller says it can't uninstall while it's running. But there's no 'exit' button on it. You try through CTRL-ALT-DEL and it just pops back up. Even if you can manage to get the entire process killed, the installer still usually gives you something along the lines of "I'm sorry Dave, I can't do that."....even in Safe Mode it won't let you remove it! I generally end up booting a Linux LiveCD and just wiping whatever Norton files I can find...only then will the uninstaller usually cooperate and clean up the rest of it.
Has anyone ever had a controlled experiment where having the full paid for version of Symantec or AVG actually provided more security than their free counterparts?
No, but I have had plenty of experiences where they (almost exclusively Symantec actually) cause a hell of a lot of problems on their own - and missed some rather nasty viruses. Disinfecting a computer that already has Norton installed is _not_ fun. Because Norton won't let you remove it, and it seems to do battle with any alternate antivirus you install. I've seen computers slowed to the point where it takes a good 5-10 minutes to move the mouse over and click the 'start' button because they accidentally had Norton and another AV installed. Not really sure why this happens either - I've seen other combinations installed without any problems. Still not a great idea, but you'd be amazed how many clueless users (and sysadmins....) hear their business offering free AV, and get that installed...when their computer already came with AV installed...and then they see a free AV mentioned online a bit later, forget that they already have _two_, and install that one too. Worst part is that usually they have someone else (who should know better) install it for them. And as mentioned, if one of those AV apps happens to be Norton, that's gonna slow it down and be harder to remove than any virus I've ever seen.
I still to this day do not know how to uninstall Norton. You try the uninstaller, and it flat-out _refuses_. Try through control panel, same thing. I usually end up booting up a Linux LiveCD and just deleting a few critical files so that it can't start up anymore...then the installer will generally run.
They can't kill anyone or have anyone killed. They can't drive drunk. No, all they have is "bigger" toys, but the POWER that comes with riches is gone - reserved by governments only.
You sure about that? They can buy off the cops and judges. And hell, even if they do get caught, they can afford the best lawyers in the country. Even if they don't get away with it entirely, they're going to get a _far_ lighter sentence than anyone else who committed the exact same crime. My father got a DUI and was given a far harsher sentence than a _17 year old_ rich kid I knew who had one. What was that kid's punishment? His highschool said they were going to withhold his diploma for a while. They never did. Yes, it was the city police that caught him, and the only even _threat_ of punishment came from his highschool. Meanwhile, the average adult who gets a DUI (doesn't even have the added crime of underage drinking) gets a huge fine, possibly jailtime, and a breathalyzer on their car for a while. Oh, and let's not forget that a $100,000 fine means a lot more to someone if it's 2 years wages compared to someone for whom it's one month's salary.
Nowadays the "ultra rich" may be able to afford many homes and travel often. But unless they fly out of non commercial terminals, they still have to stand in the TSA line line everyone else.
...Unless they're a government or airline official. But that point aside, a _lot_ of people have or rent private jets. I wouldn't quite say it's only the "ultra rich" - there are hundreds of families in Pittsburgh alone that can afford such things. I know one that rents a jet every year for their family vacation. Within the richest 1%, sure - but that's still 1 out of every 100 people.
So yeah, there might be more zeroes at the end of the net worth of rich people than there were before, but considering that "poor" people and "middle class" people usually have shelter, television, transport (private or public), food, etc, it's actually the poor who are better off than ever before.
Yea, while being thousands of dollars in debt for it - something that wasn't always possible, and certainly not as prevalent, in previous generations.
Sony didn't need bailouts for the PS3, which took several years to become profitable...
If you're a big enough company, you can sell your newest products at a loss for a while. Although I'm not sure where GM plans to make up the cost...as PS3 was obviously getting it back in games and accessories...GM probably gets some from accessories, parts, service, etc, but I can't imagine it's that much. But then again, if the losses aren't _that_ big, it could just be worth it for the good PR for a while. And for being one of the first out there. I'd say the Volt is probably the best electric car on the market right now, and building that kind of a brand will be better than any advertising campaign in 10 years or so.