My main use of Google Reader these days is to consolidate the RSS feeds from several specific news sources of my choosing. Then I pass this RSS list to the Google Reader Android ticker widget which is the best of its class. This allows me a nice, clean rotating news widget with the specific news sources I want. Not only that, but I can manage the feeds used from my desktop.
I have not found anything else that can do this, or looks as good, let alone both. I have no alternative once Google Reader goes away.:(
Agreed about the batteries and MicroSD card. This is 2013. There's no excuse for lacking these features. All my cell phones have had removable batteries back to my original Nokia candybar. On Android a single battery can't get you through a full day of use if you're a serious user, and not everyone can get to a charging source constantly. Keeping spare charged batteries is critical. Plus not everyone wants to replace their whole phone just because the original battery (a $5 part) only holds 50% of its original capacity now, when the phone is otherwise sufficient.
And expandable storage isn't just about running out of what is built-in to the device. It's critical for backups should something happen to the phone hardware (failure, damage, etc). Pop the memory card into a replacement phone, restore from Titanium Backup, and you're back up and running in short order. No other solution via the "cloud" or PC backup comes close to being as flexible, convenient or powerful. I have my phone set to automatically back up to itself (external MicroSD card) nightly, no user intervention required.
All my cell phones back to early 2000s (when it was still called "Transflash") have had expandable storage. I'm not going to start giving that up just because some manufacturers are assholes and are trying to push consumers into being conditioned/brainwashed to not expect/want that anymore.
This is 2013. Anyone trying to market a phone needs to stop pulling an Apple, insulting consumers and treating us like imbeciles. Stop gluing the case together and taking away critical options. If we wanted a stupid i-device we'd go buy a fucking iPhone. But we won't: we want Android, which normally COMES with all this. Get with the program or GTFO of the marketplace. Samsung, now HTC. It's fucking infuriating. No removable battery, or no expandable storage = no sale. Period.
I love G+ and hate FB, but it's not surprising G+ is having trouble gaining traction. For example, it's missing some pretty critical features, such as "events" and the ability to exclude individuals when posting something (there are times when I want to post something visible to all my friends except 1 or 2, just for the sake of this comment and not enough to give them their own circle, thereby breaking their permissions on everything else I posted).
Considering Google already has a slick calendar, their lack of any sort of event feature is mindblowing. Arranging events is one of the main reasons I used FB in the first place.
Umm, I buy my American, rBGH-free milk for $2.77/gallon, thank you very much.
You might want to do more research before incorrectly claiming that all American milk is produced with hormones. I'd hazard to say that most of what I see in the grocery store states quite clearly on the container that it's rBGH-free. If you can't find it here, you're not looking very hard.
Until their reception doesn't suck to the point of uselessness, they're far from "winning". Not everyone lives in a big city and doesn't travel outside a 3-square-mile radius.
you like to hack, to spend time looking for an alternative email client that fits your needs and so on. I like to have something that is full-featured and works out of the box because I like to spend my time differently.
I don't think that something you pay that lacks features out of the box is about choice, it's just about lack of features
Well, by your definition, every 12yo kid who installed AIM on his desktop computer is a "hacker".;)
Look, I'm not saying that the stock client shouldn't be able to move messages between folders. I just don't get why if you have such an aversion to installing apps that you'd get a smartphone. My old dumbphone had 100 things that it didn't do right, or didn't do at all, and there wasn't a damn thing I could do about it. Part of the reason we all love our smartphones is because they give us the ability to install different, or better, apps in order to make them suit our needs.
I guess your comment about how you being concerned how your spend your time doesn't really mesh with your previous comment about lamenting for months/years that you couldn't do a specific task on your Android phone... when for the sake of a few seconds to download a free app and put in your email info in the same manner you did to set up the stock client, you could've had that exact functionality (and much, much more).
The main reason I watch so little TV? All these crap "reality" shows. They're like an infection. Started by MTV, and now they've taken over Sci-Fi (oh, excuse me... "SyFy" *barf*), Food Network, Discovery Channel and even the History Channel. That last one is especially infuriating... what on earth do all these crap, modern reality shows have to do with "history"? Even their new slogan tries to get them off the hook: "History: Made every day". In other words, "since anything ultimately becomes 'history' eventually, it means we can show whatever we'd like".
Put something worth watching on, and I'll watch more TV. Until then, I'll "suffer" with the bare-minimum satellite package and watch mostly movies.
I live in an extremely rural, low-populated area and AT&T (GSM) gets far-better coverage than Verizon, to the point where my unfortunate Verizon-using friends are always asking to use my phone because they're getting no signal.
Why don't they just switch to AT&T, you may ask? Simple: Verizon's slimey marketing scheme which turns all their customers into unpaid salespeople. Because their plans offer "free texting (but only to other Verizon customers)" and other underhanded BS like that, it encourages lock-in and viral marketing... not for their own virtues, but on the sole basis of "all your friends are using it"
Well I have had imo and Trillian on my phone for ages and never needed the official Skype there. I was using imo well before Trillian. So there have indeed been other clients for a while.
I've owned Nokia phones in the past, and have always considered them when it came time to buy a new one. But they just ensured that will never happen again. I can see maybe dabbling with Windows Phone and offering a few sets for variety... but when the news keeps showing that Windows Phone is DoA, I don't get why Nokia would bet everything on a sinking ship. Are they truly that suicidal?
Am I the last person on earth not streaming movies?
Seriously, I don't get the appeal. Ok, you get a big library... that looks like crap. Or maybe everyone is watching all their movies and shows on tiny laptop screens now with headphones?
Even on my "small" 40", streaming Netflix looks horrible. The insane compression, 2-channel audio... ugh. I have 7.1 surround sound... which isn't uncommon these days with all the HTIB kits (mine was not). Let alone my 92" projector setup. The home theater technology improves, while the content technology migrates towards streaming and lower quality.
What the hell?
It's like video is going the way of music. People are accepting a huge paradigm shift into lower-quality for the sake of convenience. And if you're not streaming, people look at you like you have 2 heads. "What's wrong with you?" It's like trying to stay off Facebook.
When I buy a used car I don't get the original owners warranty
Not sure what brand you're buying. Maybe you need to buy a better car brand. When I bought my used car (private sale, not a dealer), it still had almost 2 years left on the warranty. And I know it transferred because I made use of it.
Most, if not all, GM plants are engineered so that they don't produce pollen. That's why farmers need to buy new seeds every year. This is done in order to prevent flux of engineered material to nature.
Yeah, I'm sure the reason is to keep it out of nature.
I have a Captivate too and share your frustration about GPS and updates, and your feelings about Samsung. However, to be fair: Samsung never promised 2.2 in September. That was a distorted internet rumor that stemmed from reports in the UK/Eurpean markets about 2.2 coming for the international Galaxy S/I9000. People incorrectly extrapolated from that that it also meant the Captivate. Once it got twisted and some people started misstating it, it spread around like wildfire and was taken to be "fact".
Neither Samsung nor AT&T ever promised September. In fact, the closest they ever got to a promise was saying for a while that their goal/target was by the end of 2010. Obviously they didn't meet that, and the word is now that it's Feb. However, you only get that date via pressing individuals. The formal/public statement is now a substanceless canned statement that I can quote verbatim:
"We are working to make the Android 2.2/Froyo upgrade available to all U.S. Galaxy S owners as soon as possible. Due to the complexity and unique functionality of each Galaxy S device, we are performing additional testing. Samsung feels it is important to make the Android 2.2/Froyo upgrade available only after we feel that we can give the millions of U.S. Galaxy S owners a simple and reliable upgrade experience. We sincerely appreciate your patience."
Well, I suppose if your hearing has deteriorated to the point where 96Kbit/s is the maximum you can discern, and the only place you're listening is in a low-fidelity mobile environment, then sure I suppose.
However, personally I can hear the difference even between 128Kbit/s and 160Kbit/s (and prefer higher), and I listen to my stuff in varied environments... from high-quality earbuds, to a car stereo, to a high-end home audio system.
No one is arguing that any digital or analog copy of a recoding is in-essence "lossy" compared to the original. However, the fact remains that CDs are the most-common high-quality method for getting digital versions of material, and are relatively inexpensive. The only advantage digital music downloads have is in the ability to purchase single tracks, and instant-gratification. Price-wise, the cost-difference between getting a whole album via MP3 downloads versus the whole-album in CD form is negligible considering the boost in audio quality. You're then free to make your 96Kbit/s Ogg Vorbis files... or later, 256Kbit/s files for your home audio system without having to re-purchase the music.
Non-DRMed, but still lossy. CDs give you an immediate physical backup and a high-quality original source for making your own lossy-compressed media files.
What I want to know is: when are cell phone data plans going to be priced based on speed, and not byte quotas per month? Since that's the only real metric that matters.
Our home internet connections are priced by bandwidth. And bandwidth (not quota totals) are what really matter on the back-end, within the cell carrier's own infrastructure. So that's how it should be priced to the consumer.
Gone would be the days of worrying about going over some stupid "quota". You have your speed, and the data will indefinitely roll in at that speed.
Slashdot Mirror
"Also, you can't buy a new computer with Windows 7"
Very much NOT true. Where I work we buy plenty of Dell computers with Win7 all the time. Just placed another large order this past Friday in fact.
I'm still trying to figure out why the Wii (not Wii U, original Wii) and the Roku use the exact same sound effects in the UI.
My main use of Google Reader these days is to consolidate the RSS feeds from several specific news sources of my choosing. Then I pass this RSS list to the Google Reader Android ticker widget which is the best of its class. This allows me a nice, clean rotating news widget with the specific news sources I want. Not only that, but I can manage the feeds used from my desktop.
I have not found anything else that can do this, or looks as good, let alone both. I have no alternative once Google Reader goes away. :(
Agreed about the batteries and MicroSD card. This is 2013. There's no excuse for lacking these features. All my cell phones have had removable batteries back to my original Nokia candybar. On Android a single battery can't get you through a full day of use if you're a serious user, and not everyone can get to a charging source constantly. Keeping spare charged batteries is critical. Plus not everyone wants to replace their whole phone just because the original battery (a $5 part) only holds 50% of its original capacity now, when the phone is otherwise sufficient.
And expandable storage isn't just about running out of what is built-in to the device. It's critical for backups should something happen to the phone hardware (failure, damage, etc). Pop the memory card into a replacement phone, restore from Titanium Backup, and you're back up and running in short order. No other solution via the "cloud" or PC backup comes close to being as flexible, convenient or powerful. I have my phone set to automatically back up to itself (external MicroSD card) nightly, no user intervention required.
All my cell phones back to early 2000s (when it was still called "Transflash") have had expandable storage. I'm not going to start giving that up just because some manufacturers are assholes and are trying to push consumers into being conditioned/brainwashed to not expect/want that anymore.
This is 2013. Anyone trying to market a phone needs to stop pulling an Apple, insulting consumers and treating us like imbeciles. Stop gluing the case together and taking away critical options. If we wanted a stupid i-device we'd go buy a fucking iPhone. But we won't: we want Android, which normally COMES with all this. Get with the program or GTFO of the marketplace. Samsung, now HTC. It's fucking infuriating. No removable battery, or no expandable storage = no sale. Period.
I love G+ and hate FB, but it's not surprising G+ is having trouble gaining traction. For example, it's missing some pretty critical features, such as "events" and the ability to exclude individuals when posting something (there are times when I want to post something visible to all my friends except 1 or 2, just for the sake of this comment and not enough to give them their own circle, thereby breaking their permissions on everything else I posted). Considering Google already has a slick calendar, their lack of any sort of event feature is mindblowing. Arranging events is one of the main reasons I used FB in the first place.
Umm, I buy my American, rBGH-free milk for $2.77/gallon, thank you very much. You might want to do more research before incorrectly claiming that all American milk is produced with hormones. I'd hazard to say that most of what I see in the grocery store states quite clearly on the container that it's rBGH-free. If you can't find it here, you're not looking very hard.
Sprint is definitely in a winning position.
Until their reception doesn't suck to the point of uselessness, they're far from "winning". Not everyone lives in a big city and doesn't travel outside a 3-square-mile radius.
you like to hack, to spend time looking for an alternative email client that fits your needs and so on. I like to have something that is full-featured and works out of the box because I like to spend my time differently.
I don't think that something you pay that lacks features out of the box is about choice, it's just about lack of features
Well, by your definition, every 12yo kid who installed AIM on his desktop computer is a "hacker". ;)
Look, I'm not saying that the stock client shouldn't be able to move messages between folders. I just don't get why if you have such an aversion to installing apps that you'd get a smartphone. My old dumbphone had 100 things that it didn't do right, or didn't do at all, and there wasn't a damn thing I could do about it. Part of the reason we all love our smartphones is because they give us the ability to install different, or better, apps in order to make them suit our needs.
I guess your comment about how you being concerned how your spend your time doesn't really mesh with your previous comment about lamenting for months/years that you couldn't do a specific task on your Android phone... when for the sake of a few seconds to download a free app and put in your email info in the same manner you did to set up the stock client, you could've had that exact functionality (and much, much more).
but finally in 2011 I can move emails across folders...
cheers
I've been doing this for ages on Android using K-9. Android is about choice... make use of it. ;)
The main reason I watch so little TV? All these crap "reality" shows. They're like an infection. Started by MTV, and now they've taken over Sci-Fi (oh, excuse me... "SyFy" *barf*), Food Network, Discovery Channel and even the History Channel. That last one is especially infuriating... what on earth do all these crap, modern reality shows have to do with "history"? Even their new slogan tries to get them off the hook: "History: Made every day". In other words, "since anything ultimately becomes 'history' eventually, it means we can show whatever we'd like".
Put something worth watching on, and I'll watch more TV. Until then, I'll "suffer" with the bare-minimum satellite package and watch mostly movies.
I live in an extremely rural, low-populated area and AT&T (GSM) gets far-better coverage than Verizon, to the point where my unfortunate Verizon-using friends are always asking to use my phone because they're getting no signal.
Why don't they just switch to AT&T, you may ask? Simple: Verizon's slimey marketing scheme which turns all their customers into unpaid salespeople. Because their plans offer "free texting (but only to other Verizon customers)" and other underhanded BS like that, it encourages lock-in and viral marketing... not for their own virtues, but on the sole basis of "all your friends are using it"
Well I have had imo and Trillian on my phone for ages and never needed the official Skype there. I was using imo well before Trillian. So there have indeed been other clients for a while.
All the various clients? Uh... what clients were there besides the official Skype client? I don't remember seeing any, and believe me, I looked.
Pidgin, Trillian, imo... you didn't look very hard.
Hello to another Vermonter, felt it here too. Not all felt it though.
Sorry you don't like that particular article I picked. Here's another:
http://hothardware.com/News/Microsoft-Continues-To-Bleed-Mobile-Market-Share-Despite-WP7/
I've owned Nokia phones in the past, and have always considered them when it came time to buy a new one. But they just ensured that will never happen again. I can see maybe dabbling with Windows Phone and offering a few sets for variety... but when the news keeps showing that Windows Phone is DoA, I don't get why Nokia would bet everything on a sinking ship. Are they truly that suicidal?
Am I the last person on earth not streaming movies?
Seriously, I don't get the appeal. Ok, you get a big library... that looks like crap. Or maybe everyone is watching all their movies and shows on tiny laptop screens now with headphones?
Even on my "small" 40", streaming Netflix looks horrible. The insane compression, 2-channel audio... ugh. I have 7.1 surround sound... which isn't uncommon these days with all the HTIB kits (mine was not). Let alone my 92" projector setup. The home theater technology improves, while the content technology migrates towards streaming and lower quality.
What the hell?
It's like video is going the way of music. People are accepting a huge paradigm shift into lower-quality for the sake of convenience. And if you're not streaming, people look at you like you have 2 heads. "What's wrong with you?" It's like trying to stay off Facebook.
When I buy a used car I don't get the original owners warranty
Not sure what brand you're buying. Maybe you need to buy a better car brand. When I bought my used car (private sale, not a dealer), it still had almost 2 years left on the warranty. And I know it transferred because I made use of it.
It was a SAAB, and I live in the USA.
Most, if not all, GM plants are engineered so that they don't produce pollen. That's why farmers need to buy new seeds every year. This is done in order to prevent flux of engineered material to nature.
Yeah, I'm sure the reason is to keep it out of nature.
Gnome works wonderfully on my (and others', including other posters in these comments) FreeBSD desktops. I can't stand KDE.
I have a Captivate too and share your frustration about GPS and updates, and your feelings about Samsung. However, to be fair: Samsung never promised 2.2 in September. That was a distorted internet rumor that stemmed from reports in the UK/Eurpean markets about 2.2 coming for the international Galaxy S/I9000. People incorrectly extrapolated from that that it also meant the Captivate. Once it got twisted and some people started misstating it, it spread around like wildfire and was taken to be "fact".
Neither Samsung nor AT&T ever promised September. In fact, the closest they ever got to a promise was saying for a while that their goal/target was by the end of 2010. Obviously they didn't meet that, and the word is now that it's Feb. However, you only get that date via pressing individuals. The formal/public statement is now a substanceless canned statement that I can quote verbatim:
"We are working to make the Android 2.2/Froyo upgrade available to all U.S. Galaxy S owners as soon as possible. Due to the complexity and unique functionality of each Galaxy S device, we are performing additional testing. Samsung feels it is important to make the Android 2.2/Froyo upgrade available only after we feel that we can give the millions of U.S. Galaxy S owners a simple and reliable upgrade experience. We sincerely appreciate your patience."
Well, I suppose if your hearing has deteriorated to the point where 96Kbit/s is the maximum you can discern, and the only place you're listening is in a low-fidelity mobile environment, then sure I suppose.
However, personally I can hear the difference even between 128Kbit/s and 160Kbit/s (and prefer higher), and I listen to my stuff in varied environments... from high-quality earbuds, to a car stereo, to a high-end home audio system.
No one is arguing that any digital or analog copy of a recoding is in-essence "lossy" compared to the original. However, the fact remains that CDs are the most-common high-quality method for getting digital versions of material, and are relatively inexpensive. The only advantage digital music downloads have is in the ability to purchase single tracks, and instant-gratification. Price-wise, the cost-difference between getting a whole album via MP3 downloads versus the whole-album in CD form is negligible considering the boost in audio quality. You're then free to make your 96Kbit/s Ogg Vorbis files... or later, 256Kbit/s files for your home audio system without having to re-purchase the music.
Non-DRMed, but still lossy. CDs give you an immediate physical backup and a high-quality original source for making your own lossy-compressed media files.
What I want to know is: when are cell phone data plans going to be priced based on speed, and not byte quotas per month? Since that's the only real metric that matters.
Our home internet connections are priced by bandwidth. And bandwidth (not quota totals) are what really matter on the back-end, within the cell carrier's own infrastructure. So that's how it should be priced to the consumer.
Gone would be the days of worrying about going over some stupid "quota". You have your speed, and the data will indefinitely roll in at that speed.
Not sure about coverage, but considering they won't even sell you a phone if you live in my state (Vermont), it kind of makes it a moot point.
If you want to try and sell up T-Mobile, they need to actually offer service first.