Why lock the iPhone? If you lose it and it is unlocked maybe someone will try to contact someone on your list and return it.
Because most people aren't trying to protect themselves from strangers, they are trying to keep their indiscretions secret from people they know. An Iphone user not wanting his boyfriend knowing he's been seeing other men is more important in their mind then keeping their confidential and compromising data secure.
I live in a house, was built in the 50's, I choose the area because it was lower cost then the area I wanted yet still offered a reasonable commute to work and nice landscape (lots of undeveloped hills and woods). I wear pants and shirts, dont know or care what the brands are. I buy the most comfortable at the best price I can find. I tend to cook my own food using "produce" (I am unaware of a name brand potato). Dont really have much of anything in my medicine cabinet other then some old prescriptions, I take what the doctor says will help.
You've missed the GP's point.
People who say they don't respond to advertising are often just oblivious to the fact they do.
The last part of that statement.
I take what the doctor says will help.
Have you investigated the medicine for yourself. When the doctor gives me something, I'll generally do a Google search on it, at the very least I'll read the packaging. I live in Oz so the doctors are generally trustworthy, but it never hurts to have a cursory understanding of what you're taking (99 times out of 100, what I find online backs up what the doctor said, but it still gives me a better understanding).
Also what about over the counter medicines such as pain relievers?
I do respond to advertising. I generally hate advertising so I respond negatively. As a response to advertising, I've stopped watching TV, listening to Radio and reading Print. As a response to on-line advertising I've installed adblock and flashblock. As a response to advertising, I'll go out of my way to avoid products who's advertising annoys me.
This puts me in the minority of people.
Advertising is not intrinsically evil, however it's mostly used in an evil manner. I'm more in favour of opt in advertising. I've signed up for several mailing lists for the express purpose of knowing when they are having a sale (Singapore Airlines, Malaysian Airlines, might notice a pattern here), I think advertising would be better if it were sought out rather then pushed on us. Google ads have the right idea, if I'm searching for "shovels" chances are a hardware store is just what I'm looking for, if I'm watching the TV, I don't give a crap about vacuum cleaners, jewellery, cheap furniture and what ever crap is getting peddled. (which is why I don't watch the TV any more, too many annoying ad's). Also google ad's are unintrusive, no flashing lights or noises trying to distract me.
Most localities do have special taxes just on hotel stays.
I wouldn't say that.
I've been to very few nations where the government has a special "tourist tax" as that's an ideal way to alienate tourism. Rather a lot of governments profit from ordinary taxes generated from tourism. Tourists from richer countries bring in money from external economies that would not have existed otherwise.
As for Malaysia specifically, they have a 10% government tax and 7.5% service charge. I'm not sure how much of the service charge goes to the Govt. but they'll see 100% of that 10% service charge. Prices are also advertised sans tax and service charge (this is what ++ means at the end of a price in Malaysia). S down town Kuala Lumpur hotel can easily cost 300 Ringit (just shy of US$100), of course a hotel in the sticks will cost less. there are also landing fees collected by Malaysia Airports (govt owned).
Well then let the BUSINESSES (hotels, amusement parks, restaurants, etc) that stand to profit from the tourism do the spending, rather than using tax dollars.
Who profits from the 10% service tax in Malaysia. Look up who owns Malaysia Airports and tell me who profits from every visitor. The government of Malaysia would be earning more in tax from this then it spends.
Using tax dollars to encourage a tourism industry is exactly what tax dollars should be spend on, if an industry can be fostered and in Malaysia, that is certainly the case.
I don't know about where you live, but in the real world the governments job is to encourage economic growth.
The $600,000 might be a little bit high, but it definitely isn't ridiculous compared to how much it can improve a country's tourism. South East Asian countries are highly dependent on tourism. There are many things I feel my country wastes money on, but this seems like a good deal. It definitely isn't waste, as it brings tourist to country and therefore jobs, money and wealth. My country spends cash on a lot more stupid things than that.
Malaysia spends a lot more then that on tourism campaigns, TV ads here in Oz alone would cost more then that.
But as you said, it would be quite profitable. Every hotel in Malaysia charges 10% government tax as well as 7.5% service charge so that's quite a little money spinner for the government. Not to mention that Malaysia Airports are owned by the M'asia govt, so landing fees are also a nice earner.
Malaysian not only has a lot of competition for tourism from it's more established northern neighbour, Thailand (who hardly needs advertising) but it now facing a lot of competition from other SE Asian nations such as Vietnam, Laos and Cambodia. Malaysia does not have the advantage of being as cheap as these nations (average hotel in Kuala Lumpur is about 300 Ringit, or ~US$100) so it needs to get recognised.
Fine summary, except that you leave one detail out: Apple always agreed to pay Nokia the same license fees that other phone makers are paying.
Fine excuse, except you leave out one detail. Apple wanted to use patents in Nokia's portfolio that were not covered under the RAND license Apple was paying.
The defending parties only make out of court deals when they know they are wrong and don't want to run the risk of paying the other sides legal fees. Apple figured out this couldn't be obfuscated in court any longer. Apple has more then enough money to fight this, so if they had a chance of wining, why wouldn't they?
But I also remember when the Xbox came out and Sony laughed that off. Then the Xbox 360 became the dominant brand in North America and suddenly Sony wasn't laughing anymore.
That says more about Sony's hubris then MS's acumen. Nintendo's response was to look at what console gamers actually wanted and produce a system that was radically different to both MS's and Sony's offerings which earned bucketloads of cash for Nintendo.
The Xbox program is a massive money sink for MS, even now the Xbox 360 is being sold for a profit but it took over 6 years to get to that point, they still haven't managed to return to profitability.
MS is still funded by OS sales, Office sales and Server products. Almost nothing else shows up as black on their P&L statements. The fact is, MS can afford this where as Sony (and Nintendo) cant.
Finally, yes, I had an (original) Xbox because of it's hackability, as for this generation, I have a Wii because I've got friends.
In all fairness, your post is misleading. Nokia was asking Apple to pay more than everyone else was paying because Apple had no IP of its own that was useful to throw into the bargaining process. Usually there is an IP swap going on as well.
In all fairness, your post is misleading.
Apple was trying to claim that Nokia patents not covered under RAND were covered under RAND and not pay the fee's that other companies who want to use these patents pay.
Why is it all the coolest toys are for iPhone/iPad only?
Reporter bias?
Iphones tend not to have the cool toys I use everyday, such as the email/calendar widget for my work mail (touchdown for Exchange). Or being able to go to any web site, even flash enabled ones and have them just work.
Even with X10, it took a few precious seconds to
activate my "opening light scheme".
This may sound petty but trust me, it's a godsend to anyone opening or closing up a shop.
Once, a long time ago I did night fill for a supermarket, to close up I had to go right to the front of the store and shut off the lights for the store (switches were under the customer service area) then all the way down the back of the warehouse to shut down the warehouse lights (OK, probably a really stupid electrics install too). As well as the office lights and staff room lights which had switches located in the rooms themselves. This procedure took almost 5 minutes, half of that in the dark (this was the age before mobile phones had torches, or the average retail worker had a mobile phone). Christmas was a complete nightmare.
The other two staff who were still around had their own jobs to do (alarms and locks). The ability to kill lights and set alarms from one place would have been bliss. I'd hate to imagine the pain if you had a complex light set-up that needed periodic adjustment.
The fanboys seem a lot more bitter these days, did Steve cut the sugar content of the Kool Aid recently?
Well, considering that he was modded Insightful instead of Funny.
At the time of posting, dear AC he was -1.
Oh how quickly the mod tables turn on/.
I also now have to revise my theory of mod point assignment as the Apple fanboys always used to get mod points after me and my last batch expired on Saturday.
Unless you are suggesting I use the hardware I've already got, my AMD Phenom II based desktop where Windows is A$200 and OSX is A$WILL NOT RUN.
Then you give MS credit for x86 architecture,
What I said was:
IBM and MS with the x86 and DOS
IBM chose to make an x86 PC using off the shelf parts. I'm sorry I thought you'd be able to understand examples were respective.
Might want to streamline your arguments a little better, next time. You run all over the place with little direction, mixing your arguments into each other.
I'm sorry you have trouble keeping up, but that's your problem. Perhaps/. is a bit too complicated for you.
Computers used to be reliable, simple to use and required very little technical skills. Microsoft and Intel ruined this with their lousy inferior designs (Amigas, Atari STs and Acorn Archimedes computers were much nicer to use).
Awaken from your dreamy state fanboy,
Computers back then required a degree in CS to operate and a small fortune to buy.
IBM and MS with the x86 and DOS bought computing power not only to the understanding of mere mortals, but made computers affordable by mere mortals.
What you forget is how expensive and limited computers were before the DOS days, DOS bought a simple to learn OS to the masses. As much as I hate and deride MS for it's monopolistic behaviour after this, you have to give them credit where credit is due, if not for the x86 architecture, computers would 10 times as expensive and do half as much. DOS and Windows really did put PC's onto every desk.
So far from dumbing down computers, Apple and others are trying to get us back to where we were before Microsoft
Expensive proprietary HW with equally expensive and proprietary OS's. Locked down features that you have to pay extra for despite the feature being installed by default, you need to pay extra for them to flick a switch and activate it. Because that's what PC's were like before x86. Without the IBM PC, everyone would still be using separate processor architectures, no one would be looking at ARM as a single architecture, you owe x86 for demonstrating that uniform hardware across manufacturers leads to greater innovation.
You need a serious reality check... and some history lessons.
Now, if the Tab had come $100 cheaper and offered me something MORE than what the iPad2 does, I would be all over it. But for the same price it's just not worth it to lose the ease of use, interoperability, and application support.
Exactly. It's not enough to match the ipad, it has to be CHEAPER than the ipad to be worthwhile for normal people.
Not meant as flamebait, but I believe Android would never have gotten as popular as now if the iphone hadn't been limited to one carrier and priced higher than the android phones in the USA.
I hate to break this to you, but in other parts of the world like Europe the Iphone was not limited to one carrier, yet Android managed to become more popular in Europe faster then it did in the US. So your theory does not hold water, Especially as the US is far from the forefront of mobile technology (for that, you need to look at Asia where the Galaxy Tab 10.1 Wifi is already a mere 15,000 Baht).
Also, as far as price goes, wait a month or two, you'll see the price of Android tablets drop as there is more competition, you wont see this with Apple. So the early adopters will pick it up for $750 (BTW, that's at the cheap end of Ipads in Oz) and the early majority will pick it up for $675 in a month or two. The late majority will get it for $625 and laggards will get it for about $500 when Samsung are preparing to release the next model. Just like what happened with the original Galaxy Tab.
I picked up an Acer Iconia tab for A$421 (16 GB, wifi-only) a few weeks back, the nearest competing Ipad was A$579 and the Ipad is nowhere near as flexible as the Iconia. Toshiba are looking at releasing their tablet at US$480. In the end, the same thing will happen with tablets as happened with phones, it's not about shininess or snappiness, it's about do or not do and Iphones "not do" a lot, Android became popular because it can do things, not because it was cheaper, that was merely a nice side effect.
Open platforms always win, DOS won over locked down desktop OS's, Linux has almost killed proprietary Unix.
Apple may have been working on this functionality for iOS 5, when Hughes released his version, but that doesn't excuse the arrogant behavior. At the very least, they could have brought him in as a consultant or paid him for his efforts.
Why are people surprised,
First Apple sue Samsung for having rounded corners that look something like the Iphone, then reveal that they ripped the notification drop down box out of Android and bolted it into IOS.
Stealing other peoples ideas is Apple's modus operandi.
The result is that Britain is suffering from a severe case of 'libel chill', where publishers and newspapers are afraid to publish a story because the subject, usually a celebrity, might decide to sue.
Newspapers, I cant call them that, we aren't talking about reputable organisations like the Beeb, we are talking about papers like the Daily Mail...
So tabloids have for so long been printing deliberately misleading and exaggerated stories often with pictures obtained using legally dubious means that the people that have been victims of such articles are forced to take desperate measures.
Basically, "libel chill" does not affect any organisation that prints factual information without spin, it affects organisations that invent controversy and prints lies.
The fact that this problem exists is not sad. What is sad is the fact that there are good reasons for this situation existing. Tabloids have bought this upon themselves, If the Daily Mail/Sun did not spend all it's time digging through celebrity rubbish and printing deliberately misleading information then such a problem would not exist.
The daily mail has made a business of skirting libel for almost a century, it's about damn time they became afraid of the people they are antagonising.
Freedom of Speech
Last time I checked, freedom of speech did not give you the right to publish lies with no consequence. This is the old "fire in a crowded theatre" argument, deliberately misleading speech is not protected, even in the US.
Freedom, without responsibility is not freedom at all. This "libel chill" is a result of publishers taking the piss and now they're crying about it. Get over it Murdoch.
I'm a little buzzed and 0.001% over is all it takes.
And they call Oz a police state. Here it's 0.05% unless you're a P2 probationary driver (Green P plates) where it's 0.02% or 0.00% for P1 probationary (Red P plates) and Learner (L plates) drivers.
P1 probationary is only for the first six months. It's good as it lets other motorists know you are a really green driver. Of course this does not stop wankers from cutting you off.
jee/. you are acting like high school students that don't understand why they should hush. Every student thinks that a little quiet talk is not going to cause a problem, but if you are a lecturer you would understand that this coming out from 30+ students can cause a lot of noise!
The regulation is for everyone on the plane, not just for you.
Finally, someone pointed that out. The problem isn't with one device, or even one rouge or malfunctioning device, the problem is with one hundred devices.
People are also ignoring the effects of acceleration on items not screwed or strapped to the plane itself. When Joe Idiot loses grip on his Iphone during take off, it does have enough weight under that much acceleration that it can break someone's nose. So imagine what an 700g tablet or 3 KG laptop could do.
When people sue over coffee being too hot, they will sure as hell sue when their own laptop gives them a broken nose. I already think the price of an air ticket is too high and every lawsuit over a passengers idiocy will make liability insurance skyrocket (which is already a significant part of your ticket cost).
So please, do as your told, airlines have spent a lot more time thinking about what could possibly go wrong then you have.
Slashdot Mirror
Why lock the iPhone? If you lose it and it is unlocked maybe someone will try to contact someone on your list and return it.
Because most people aren't trying to protect themselves from strangers, they are trying to keep their indiscretions secret from people they know. An Iphone user not wanting his boyfriend knowing he's been seeing other men is more important in their mind then keeping their confidential and compromising data secure.
Please, if you have to use quotes, could you at least put that "experts" in them too?
What if they were experts, say in engineering or economics as opposed to social media.
I live in a house, was built in the 50's, I choose the area because it was lower cost then the area I wanted yet still offered a reasonable commute to work and nice landscape (lots of undeveloped hills and woods). I wear pants and shirts, dont know or care what the brands are. I buy the most comfortable at the best price I can find. I tend to cook my own food using "produce" (I am unaware of a name brand potato). Dont really have much of anything in my medicine cabinet other then some old prescriptions, I take what the doctor says will help.
You've missed the GP's point.
People who say they don't respond to advertising are often just oblivious to the fact they do. The last part of that statement.
Have you investigated the medicine for yourself. When the doctor gives me something, I'll generally do a Google search on it, at the very least I'll read the packaging. I live in Oz so the doctors are generally trustworthy, but it never hurts to have a cursory understanding of what you're taking (99 times out of 100, what I find online backs up what the doctor said, but it still gives me a better understanding).
Also what about over the counter medicines such as pain relievers?
I do respond to advertising. I generally hate advertising so I respond negatively. As a response to advertising, I've stopped watching TV, listening to Radio and reading Print. As a response to on-line advertising I've installed adblock and flashblock. As a response to advertising, I'll go out of my way to avoid products who's advertising annoys me.
This puts me in the minority of people.
Advertising is not intrinsically evil, however it's mostly used in an evil manner. I'm more in favour of opt in advertising. I've signed up for several mailing lists for the express purpose of knowing when they are having a sale (Singapore Airlines, Malaysian Airlines, might notice a pattern here), I think advertising would be better if it were sought out rather then pushed on us. Google ads have the right idea, if I'm searching for "shovels" chances are a hardware store is just what I'm looking for, if I'm watching the TV, I don't give a crap about vacuum cleaners, jewellery, cheap furniture and what ever crap is getting peddled. (which is why I don't watch the TV any more, too many annoying ad's). Also google ad's are unintrusive, no flashing lights or noises trying to distract me.
Most localities do have special taxes just on hotel stays.
I wouldn't say that.
I've been to very few nations where the government has a special "tourist tax" as that's an ideal way to alienate tourism. Rather a lot of governments profit from ordinary taxes generated from tourism. Tourists from richer countries bring in money from external economies that would not have existed otherwise.
As for Malaysia specifically, they have a 10% government tax and 7.5% service charge. I'm not sure how much of the service charge goes to the Govt. but they'll see 100% of that 10% service charge. Prices are also advertised sans tax and service charge (this is what ++ means at the end of a price in Malaysia). S down town Kuala Lumpur hotel can easily cost 300 Ringit (just shy of US$100), of course a hotel in the sticks will cost less. there are also landing fees collected by Malaysia Airports (govt owned).
Who profits from the 10% service tax in Malaysia. Look up who owns Malaysia Airports and tell me who profits from every visitor. The government of Malaysia would be earning more in tax from this then it spends.
Using tax dollars to encourage a tourism industry is exactly what tax dollars should be spend on, if an industry can be fostered and in Malaysia, that is certainly the case.
I don't know about where you live, but in the real world the governments job is to encourage economic growth.
The $600,000 might be a little bit high, but it definitely isn't ridiculous compared to how much it can improve a country's tourism. South East Asian countries are highly dependent on tourism. There are many things I feel my country wastes money on, but this seems like a good deal. It definitely isn't waste, as it brings tourist to country and therefore jobs, money and wealth. My country spends cash on a lot more stupid things than that.
Malaysia spends a lot more then that on tourism campaigns, TV ads here in Oz alone would cost more then that.
But as you said, it would be quite profitable. Every hotel in Malaysia charges 10% government tax as well as 7.5% service charge so that's quite a little money spinner for the government. Not to mention that Malaysia Airports are owned by the M'asia govt, so landing fees are also a nice earner.
Malaysian not only has a lot of competition for tourism from it's more established northern neighbour, Thailand (who hardly needs advertising) but it now facing a lot of competition from other SE Asian nations such as Vietnam, Laos and Cambodia. Malaysia does not have the advantage of being as cheap as these nations (average hotel in Kuala Lumpur is about 300 Ringit, or ~US$100) so it needs to get recognised.
Fine summary, except that you leave one detail out: Apple always agreed to pay Nokia the same license fees that other phone makers are paying.
Fine excuse, except you leave out one detail. Apple wanted to use patents in Nokia's portfolio that were not covered under the RAND license Apple was paying.
The defending parties only make out of court deals when they know they are wrong and don't want to run the risk of paying the other sides legal fees. Apple figured out this couldn't be obfuscated in court any longer. Apple has more then enough money to fight this, so if they had a chance of wining, why wouldn't they?
That were never really popular.
Blackberry was never popular?
That says more about Sony's hubris then MS's acumen. Nintendo's response was to look at what console gamers actually wanted and produce a system that was radically different to both MS's and Sony's offerings which earned bucketloads of cash for Nintendo.
The Xbox program is a massive money sink for MS, even now the Xbox 360 is being sold for a profit but it took over 6 years to get to that point, they still haven't managed to return to profitability.
MS is still funded by OS sales, Office sales and Server products. Almost nothing else shows up as black on their P&L statements. The fact is, MS can afford this where as Sony (and Nintendo) cant.
Finally, yes, I had an (original) Xbox because of it's hackability, as for this generation, I have a Wii because I've got friends.
In all fairness, your post is misleading. Nokia was asking Apple to pay more than everyone else was paying because Apple had no IP of its own that was useful to throw into the bargaining process. Usually there is an IP swap going on as well.
In all fairness, your post is misleading.
Apple was trying to claim that Nokia patents not covered under RAND were covered under RAND and not pay the fee's that other companies who want to use these patents pay.
Why is it all the coolest toys are for iPhone/iPad only?
Reporter bias?
Iphones tend not to have the cool toys I use everyday, such as the email/calendar widget for my work mail (touchdown for Exchange). Or being able to go to any web site, even flash enabled ones and have them just work.
Even with X10, it took a few precious seconds to activate my "opening light scheme".
This may sound petty but trust me, it's a godsend to anyone opening or closing up a shop.
Once, a long time ago I did night fill for a supermarket, to close up I had to go right to the front of the store and shut off the lights for the store (switches were under the customer service area) then all the way down the back of the warehouse to shut down the warehouse lights (OK, probably a really stupid electrics install too). As well as the office lights and staff room lights which had switches located in the rooms themselves. This procedure took almost 5 minutes, half of that in the dark (this was the age before mobile phones had torches, or the average retail worker had a mobile phone). Christmas was a complete nightmare.
The other two staff who were still around had their own jobs to do (alarms and locks). The ability to kill lights and set alarms from one place would have been bliss. I'd hate to imagine the pain if you had a complex light set-up that needed periodic adjustment.
The fanboys seem a lot more bitter these days, did Steve cut the sugar content of the Kool Aid recently?
Well, considering that he was modded Insightful instead of Funny.
At the time of posting, dear AC he was -1.
/.
Oh how quickly the mod tables turn on
I also now have to revise my theory of mod point assignment as the Apple fanboys always used to get mod points after me and my last batch expired on Saturday.
Since you are Armenian, you are biased.
Maybe the GGP is not Armenian or even European, but has left an allusion to some bad recent history of Turkey.
Sent from my Kurd.
it's also possible that Turkey is cracking down on dissidents, using Anonymous as a cover story.
A fine upstanding nation like Turkey,
Surely you jest.
Sent from my ethnic Armenian.
Windows laptop A$600.
Apple Laptop A$1200.
Unless you are suggesting I use the hardware I've already got, my AMD Phenom II based desktop where Windows is A$200 and OSX is A$WILL NOT RUN.
What I said was:
IBM chose to make an x86 PC using off the shelf parts. I'm sorry I thought you'd be able to understand examples were respective.
I'm sorry you have trouble keeping up, but that's your problem. Perhaps /. is a bit too complicated for you.
Mine were much funnier.
That they were,
The fanboys seem a lot more bitter these days, did Steve cut the sugar content of the Kool Aid recently?
Awaken from your dreamy state fanboy,
Computers back then required a degree in CS to operate and a small fortune to buy.
IBM and MS with the x86 and DOS bought computing power not only to the understanding of mere mortals, but made computers affordable by mere mortals.
What you forget is how expensive and limited computers were before the DOS days, DOS bought a simple to learn OS to the masses. As much as I hate and deride MS for it's monopolistic behaviour after this, you have to give them credit where credit is due, if not for the x86 architecture, computers would 10 times as expensive and do half as much. DOS and Windows really did put PC's onto every desk.
Expensive proprietary HW with equally expensive and proprietary OS's. Locked down features that you have to pay extra for despite the feature being installed by default, you need to pay extra for them to flick a switch and activate it. Because that's what PC's were like before x86. Without the IBM PC, everyone would still be using separate processor architectures, no one would be looking at ARM as a single architecture, you owe x86 for demonstrating that uniform hardware across manufacturers leads to greater innovation.
You need a serious reality check... and some history lessons.
stupid lack of USB and HDMI connectors.
Bad luck Samsung, maybe one of your competitors won't be so dumb, I'll wait for them.
Why wait,
The Acer Iconia is already released, granted not with a 3G version yet, I have this tablet and it has a mini HDMI and full size USB port.
Now, if the Tab had come $100 cheaper and offered me something MORE than what the iPad2 does, I would be all over it. But for the same price it's just not worth it to lose the ease of use, interoperability, and application support.
Exactly. It's not enough to match the ipad, it has to be CHEAPER than the ipad to be worthwhile for normal people.
Not meant as flamebait, but I believe Android would never have gotten as popular as now if the iphone hadn't been limited to one carrier and priced higher than the android phones in the USA.
I hate to break this to you, but in other parts of the world like Europe the Iphone was not limited to one carrier, yet Android managed to become more popular in Europe faster then it did in the US. So your theory does not hold water, Especially as the US is far from the forefront of mobile technology (for that, you need to look at Asia where the Galaxy Tab 10.1 Wifi is already a mere 15,000 Baht).
Also, as far as price goes, wait a month or two, you'll see the price of Android tablets drop as there is more competition, you wont see this with Apple. So the early adopters will pick it up for $750 (BTW, that's at the cheap end of Ipads in Oz) and the early majority will pick it up for $675 in a month or two. The late majority will get it for $625 and laggards will get it for about $500 when Samsung are preparing to release the next model. Just like what happened with the original Galaxy Tab.
I picked up an Acer Iconia tab for A$421 (16 GB, wifi-only) a few weeks back, the nearest competing Ipad was A$579 and the Ipad is nowhere near as flexible as the Iconia. Toshiba are looking at releasing their tablet at US$480. In the end, the same thing will happen with tablets as happened with phones, it's not about shininess or snappiness, it's about do or not do and Iphones "not do" a lot, Android became popular because it can do things, not because it was cheaper, that was merely a nice side effect.
Open platforms always win, DOS won over locked down desktop OS's, Linux has almost killed proprietary Unix.
Apple may have been working on this functionality for iOS 5, when Hughes released his version, but that doesn't excuse the arrogant behavior. At the very least, they could have brought him in as a consultant or paid him for his efforts.
Why are people surprised,
First Apple sue Samsung for having rounded corners that look something like the Iphone, then reveal that they ripped the notification drop down box out of Android and bolted it into IOS.
Stealing other peoples ideas is Apple's modus operandi.
Newspapers, I cant call them that, we aren't talking about reputable organisations like the Beeb, we are talking about papers like the Daily Mail...
So tabloids have for so long been printing deliberately misleading and exaggerated stories often with pictures obtained using legally dubious means that the people that have been victims of such articles are forced to take desperate measures.
Basically, "libel chill" does not affect any organisation that prints factual information without spin, it affects organisations that invent controversy and prints lies.
The fact that this problem exists is not sad. What is sad is the fact that there are good reasons for this situation existing. Tabloids have bought this upon themselves, If the Daily Mail/Sun did not spend all it's time digging through celebrity rubbish and printing deliberately misleading information then such a problem would not exist.
The daily mail has made a business of skirting libel for almost a century, it's about damn time they became afraid of the people they are antagonising.
Last time I checked, freedom of speech did not give you the right to publish lies with no consequence. This is the old "fire in a crowded theatre" argument, deliberately misleading speech is not protected, even in the US.
Freedom, without responsibility is not freedom at all. This "libel chill" is a result of publishers taking the piss and now they're crying about it. Get over it Murdoch.
It's not libel if it is the truth!
Find me a picture of a donkey wearing Mr Rakofsky on it's head then.
I'm a little buzzed and 0.001% over is all it takes.
And they call Oz a police state. Here it's 0.05% unless you're a P2 probationary driver (Green P plates) where it's 0.02% or 0.00% for P1 probationary (Red P plates) and Learner (L plates) drivers.
P1 probationary is only for the first six months. It's good as it lets other motorists know you are a really green driver. Of course this does not stop wankers from cutting you off.
jee /. you are acting like high school students that don't understand why they should hush. Every student thinks that a little quiet talk is not going to cause a problem, but if you are a lecturer you would understand that this coming out from 30+ students can cause a lot of noise!
The regulation is for everyone on the plane, not just for you.
Finally, someone pointed that out. The problem isn't with one device, or even one rouge or malfunctioning device, the problem is with one hundred devices.
People are also ignoring the effects of acceleration on items not screwed or strapped to the plane itself. When Joe Idiot loses grip on his Iphone during take off, it does have enough weight under that much acceleration that it can break someone's nose. So imagine what an 700g tablet or 3 KG laptop could do.
When people sue over coffee being too hot, they will sure as hell sue when their own laptop gives them a broken nose. I already think the price of an air ticket is too high and every lawsuit over a passengers idiocy will make liability insurance skyrocket (which is already a significant part of your ticket cost).
So please, do as your told, airlines have spent a lot more time thinking about what could possibly go wrong then you have.