"you might call Silicon Valley executives libertarians"
Wait you were serious?
Libertarianism is just anarchy for rich people. Like poor anarchists, they're fine shouting about how bad the government is when they're doing well, but when things turn bad, they're all "too big to fail".
And, as Karl Marx taught us, Socialism is merely a stepping stone to Communism.
Its clear you've never actually read Marx... this is evident because you think communism is this:
when the government can control any aspect of the production it chooses to.
when the government can control any aspect of the production it chooses to.
Which you seem to have gotten from an Alt-Right site.
Communism is social (as in communal) production, not government production. Marx said the people should own the means of production (Marx laboured on this point for quite a bit). When the government owns the means of production its called Fascism, which is an extremist right-wing form of government.
Also Fascism is not collectivist. Not in the slightest, in fact it's the opposite where a privileged class is enforced by the government (as Orwell put it, party members and proles). Nazi Germany and Soviet Russia were staunch enemies because their political philosophies were extremely opposed to each other. In fact the first thing facist governments did in the 1920/30's was kill all the Bolsheviks and other actual socialists. This is why in Martin NiemÃller's "First they came for" soliloquy the Communists and Trade unionists were the first the Nazis actually came for (long before they started persecuting Jews).
Because a lot of Americans fall into the Libertarian "business transactions are between you and the business, not the government" trap, even when it severely disadvantages them.
Half way there.
A Libertarian is someone who wants the government to butt out when they're doing well but demands government protection when things turn against them.
I'm yet to see a Libertarian refuse a government handout (doing so would be kind of anti-libertarian as you're refusing free money, hypocrisy built into the system).
Apple argues that the company cannot guarantee any iPhone for more than a year.
I guess they should pull out of the EU then seeing how they are unable to meet the minimum legal required guarantee. Or does the QC department bin the devices and send the good ones to the EU and the crappy ones to the USA where consumers are used to being screwed over and not have any recourse other than costly legal battles or lawyer enriching class actions which may net them a $15 discount coupon?
Doesn't quite work that way with the EU. When the EU goes after you for violating the law, they go after you properly. None of this lawyer enriching class action bollocks, the EU itself takes you to court and returns the money to its members in deductions and rebates.
Besides Apple wont pull out of the EU, they'll just accept that the phone has a 2 year life in Europe and a 1 year life in the US (unless you buy an extended warranty)... Not like they're the exact same phone, made in the exact same factory, in the exact same part of China or anything.
To be fair, the term was "premium brand," which Apple - arguably - is.
Apple is by far, not a premium brand. Its an expensive one, but not premium. Even then, they're not so expensive as to price themselves out of availability for everyone. Here in the UK even someone on benefits (welfare) can get an Iphone. They're like a Toyota Camry and we can hardly call Toyota a premium brand
However, such a brand can be applied to all kinds of shonky products - Ferrari and Porsche, for example, sell all kinds of branded, over-priced tat.
Right about the first part, wrong about the second.
Ferrari's and Porsches have attributes that set them apart from cheaper competition (although the Porsche is the cheap Ferrari). You cant replicate a 488 for much less than a 488 costs. You cant say the same about Apple. Apple is like what Volkswagen does in Australia. VW pretends its a premium brand in Australia when they're common as muck in here in Europe and no more expensive than a Toyota. They aren't better quality or have better features than their competition, but they charge a premium because of the badge.
My Nexus 6P also can only fast charge on a USB-C charger.
The real news is that the iPhones don't include the cable and fast charger in the box.
My Nexus 5x fast charges from the wall using the cable and charger provided in the box. It also fast charges from a USB 3.0 port, but not as fast as from the wall.
Perhaps you forgot to read even the summary, this is a hardware maker talking about hardware features. IOS updates, however rapidly and widely distributed, are never going to be able to add any of the features listed above.
Yep, when it comes to software features, Apple still hasn't implemented some things Android has had since day 1.
What's funny is during the keynote they listed the resolution for landscape while showing the iPhone in portrait orientation.
You seem to be under the impression that an Apple keynote is about passing on useful information and accurate specifications. Please report to your nearest Steve Jobs Memorial iReducation centre.
An Apple keynote is about giving fanboys wank material whilst ignoring that someone else had invented it first.
The funniest thing was them trying to show it off working on stage, and it failed asking him to use his PIN instead because face recognition failed.
Android has had this for some time, you pretty much have two options with trying to use a face as a password. 1. Make it so stringent that it fails 99% of the time, 2. Make is so lax that someone with a different skin colour can pass it.
I believe this was first introduced in Ice Cream Sandwich, which was released in Oct 2011. In the last 6 years, it's never been more than a gimmick.
You can't have it both ways. Really, you can't. Either the car is driving or the person is driving. Expecting that a person will let the car drive AND ALSO stay 100% ready to take over is just not reality.
Because this is emphatically not true is the main reason the Google autonomous car has had only one at fault accident.
Its not that we are incapable of monitoring an autonomous system, we are, in fact there are many careers that mainly consist of watching an autonomous machine doing its thing and stepping in when things go wrong.
The problem is that most people wont. Not because they cant but because they're lazy and marketing has sold them the impression that autonomous cars will do everything for them whilst they sit back faffing about with their phone. This will be a sore disappointment for these people.
Incorrect.
Autopilot combined with pilot saves lives. Dependence on autopilot has demonstrated the opposite effect, as evidenced in Asiana flight 214 and absolutely will not save lives when the pilot orders it to fly into a mountain (Germanwings flight 9525).
The main reason that Google's self driving car has only had one at fault accident is because it had a professional driver who was been paying attention. The next biggest reason is that it's only been tested in sunny California. I'd like to see it on the narrow and mean streets of Aberdeen in winter.
It will be the same with autonomous cars, once idiots get into them and assume that the car does everything for them whilst they pissfart about on their phone we'll see accident rates increase.
Here in Norway we just had a general election last night:
Just 2-3 weeks ago Jan T Sanner, the minister with responsibility for elections, decided that every single vote had to be counted manually, including all early voting ballots. Previously those votes had been counted using optical scanners but with the news about how hackable most voting machines have turned out to be, he decided that we won't trust them.
Voting booths closed at 21:00 and the trend (our current prime minister will almost certainly get another 4 years) was immediately clear even though many of the details were less settled. This is mainly due to our voting setup with 169 representatives from 19 counties, where each party is supposed to get a total number which corresponds as closely as possible to the total vote counts, but with a cutoff of 4.0%: If a party gets less than that they will not get any of the final 19 slots which goes to the parties which have gotten too few direct representatives.
This morning at 07:00 we had passed 95% of total votes counted and a couple of the smaller parties had just managed to lift safely above the 4.0% cutoff point, so now the result is for all practical purposes final.
The key idea is that in all countries with "one person - one vote" the effort needed to do a full manual count (which is actually a dual count and verification) is exactly proportional to the size of the country, so it should be just as easy to do this in the US as in Norway!
Terje
Australia had a national election last year, it took over 2 weeks for a leading party to be established as it came down to counting postal votes in many electorates.
That being said, there is nothing wrong with paper votes leaving a verifiable trail. It means that votes can be trusted in cases like the 2016 Australian federal election.
I negotiated three weeks off per year, non-contiguous. Then as soon as I turned 30, I was laid off permanently, and never worked again. I miss food.
I work in a country that protects the rights of its workers. I have 20 days holiday as standard. My employer gives me an additional 5 as part of my salary package, I can purchase another 5 by sacrificing my salary and there are 8 bank holidays (public holidays). I'm 35 and still gainfully employed, many of my colleagues are even older. I also earn more than my US colleagues.
I also miss food, but that's because I live in England and the closest place for a decent meal is across the channel.
Sigh, that's meant to be 20 days (4 working weeks).
I negotiated three weeks off per year, non-contiguous. Then as soon as I turned 30, I was laid off permanently, and never worked again. I miss food.
I work in a country that protects the rights of its workers. I have 20 weeks holiday as standard. My employer gives me an additional 5 as part of my salary package, I can purchase another 5 by sacrificing my salary and there are 8 bank holidays (public holidays). I'm 35 and still gainfully employed, many of my colleagues are even older. I also earn more than my US colleagues.
I also miss food, but that's because I live in England and the closest place for a decent meal is across the channel.
Just wait until he tries to demo the animoji thing. Even the emojis will look bored.
Aren't these "Animoji" things pretty much what 19-20 year old Colombian/Filipino girls already send me over Facebook/Whats App? Animated pictures of anthropomorphised bears/cats blowing kisses or heart floating away.
I hope they're incompatible with Android. Realistically I don't want this crap from a 32 yr old man-child fanboy whom I definitely don't want to see sans pants. This is one feature I'd be happy to have as an Iphone exclusive.
So yes, Apple "leaks" things, but as a company that directly or indirectly employs hundreds of thousands of employees, they occasionally actually leak things too, and this DEFINITELY
Came direct from the Marketing department.
These leaks are getting worse because Apple is struggling for relevance in a world where they're now almost beyond passe. This is just an outcry saying "Please, please pretend I'm still relevant". The mere mention of speculation of the hope of a leak before an Apple product announcement used to generate hundreds upon hundreds of comments. Now we can barely get 100 in a whole day and half of those are people saying " Yawn, this was completely expected".
They are "crippling" the batteries to make them last longer which, in cases of emergency, you do not care about. Still, it would be nice if they provided an interface to manage it ourselves instead of acting as mighty god through some kind of mighty galactic, over the air, update.
This, what kills Li-ion batteries quickly is letting them completely discharge. Tesla have to guarantee the life of the battery for X years accounting for the worst abuse that owners can throw at it. They're just following the standard procedure for most automotive manufacturers, build the car to cater for the worst idiot that could own it.
Its not like this kind of thing is unheard of, the fuel gauge consistently lies about being empty because running out of fuel causes problems (especially to diesels) and its designed this way because people are idiots.
The definition of a "SWJ" is someone who advocates social justice, not someone who realizes social justice in their own lives.
No, the definition of SJW is "evil boogeymen" with a side order of "I'm a fuckwit".
This,
SJW is a made up term by people who want to use bigoted arguments but demonise those who would point out their bigotry. It's modern origination comes from gamergate, it was used to try and denigrate those who didn't believe in rampant sexism.
Its taken over from "PC", mainly because PC was used so often as a byword for "something I don't like but cant find a rational argument against" that PC has lost all meaning and impact. SJW will soon go the same way as it gives more negative connotations about it's user, than those it is used against.
Google acquired Motorola Mobility and then sold it off just a couple of years later. Why repeat that move?
First, Motorola was a patent play. Google gained much protection by buying the patent portfolio.
Second, Google's tried the 3rd party vendor route and gotten shit products out of it and continues watching Apple reap 95% of the mobile profit. Pixel was an attempt by Google to create a realistic competitor that would actually help them. Now that the Pixel appears realistic, Google needs more control to keep up with Apple who is ahead in many areas. (Hint, there's a reason besides fanboism that Apple has 95% of the profits)
Google buying HTC outright will have another immediate effect - Samsung's profits. Unless Samsung takes a page out of the same book and creates their own OS dev team and branches Android into their own offering.
The reason Apple makes significant profits (nowhere near 95%) is that they overcharge for everything. The Iphone hardware is 1/5 of the phones cost here in the UK. You can get the same spec from Samsung for less, go for a lesser known brand like Huawei, WileyFox or OnePlus and it's even cheaper. These companies are still making a profit, just not obscene amounts.
Also Samsung has little to worry about from HTC or Google's acquisition of HTC.
Now the real reason Google are buying HTC is because HTC are in dire straights financially and that makes it the perfect time to acquire them.
Shouldn't people be allowed to take vacations? I have no problem with this.
Whilst your company is going down the tubes, you're damn straight an exec should not be on holiday. But hey, at least this guy is consistent, consistently a douche-bag, but consistent.
I get a lot of car news via facebook. New model releases, updates, spectacular crashes, so on and so forth from various sites I've subscribed to. Every now and then you even get something news worthy through that no-one else picked up on like that time a few million quid of Jaguar/Land Rover engines got stolen. The Daily Mail and their ilk were too busy with a massive story in France where SOMEONE IN A BURKA stole a hundred Euro to bother with a piffling story such as millions of pounds of JLR engines being brazenly stolen in broad daylight.
A lot of my friends get their sporting news from FB although like me, for serious news they'll generally go to a legitimate source like the BBC for national and world events.
I'm not surprised people are turning to facebook and Twitter for their news, just look at the shite published in something like the Sun. Clickbait headline, Celebrity Gossip, Page3 girl (basically soft porn, for those on the other side of the pond), more celebrity gossip, clearly biased political story, possibly another Page 3 girl, clickbait sports headline. It's little wonder fake news has become indistinguishable from actual news, people have been force fed it from tabloid rags for decades now.
But I digress, does it really matter that a lot of people now get their sports updates and celeb goss from Facebook and Twitter instead of ESPN and E!? I think a better question is, how many people get all their news from social media and how many dont fact check?
Since the presidency of the EU is not "big government", it's literally just a rotating position that gives countries an opportunity to propose an agenda. Estonia has pissed it's opportunity away by proposing something that seems to violate the human rights of EU citizens (the right to privacy in particular) and which has no hope of ever being adopted or even influencing the legislation.
Before you complain about the EU, note that it has some of the strongest privacy protections in the world. They have been used to stop government spying, they have been used to force massive multinational companies like Google to respect individual privacy. And those are actual, written and enforced law, not some random proposal that has zero chance of ever being enacted.
This.
In a free, democratic parliament you can propose any law you like, no matter how stupid. Proposing a law does not guarantee it'll pass.
Slashdot Mirror
"you might call Silicon Valley executives libertarians"
Wait you were serious?
Libertarianism is just anarchy for rich people. Like poor anarchists, they're fine shouting about how bad the government is when they're doing well, but when things turn bad, they're all "too big to fail".
Wrong.
Its clear you've never actually read Marx... this is evident because you think communism is this:
when the government can control any aspect of the production it chooses to.
Which you seem to have gotten from an Alt-Right site.
Communism is social (as in communal) production, not government production. Marx said the people should own the means of production (Marx laboured on this point for quite a bit). When the government owns the means of production its called Fascism, which is an extremist right-wing form of government.
Also Fascism is not collectivist. Not in the slightest, in fact it's the opposite where a privileged class is enforced by the government (as Orwell put it, party members and proles). Nazi Germany and Soviet Russia were staunch enemies because their political philosophies were extremely opposed to each other. In fact the first thing facist governments did in the 1920/30's was kill all the Bolsheviks and other actual socialists. This is why in Martin NiemÃller's "First they came for" soliloquy the Communists and Trade unionists were the first the Nazis actually came for (long before they started persecuting Jews).
I have to wonder who mods this tripe up.
Because a lot of Americans fall into the Libertarian "business transactions are between you and the business, not the government" trap, even when it severely disadvantages them.
Half way there.
A Libertarian is someone who wants the government to butt out when they're doing well but demands government protection when things turn against them.
I'm yet to see a Libertarian refuse a government handout (doing so would be kind of anti-libertarian as you're refusing free money, hypocrisy built into the system).
Apple argues that the company cannot guarantee any iPhone for more than a year.
I guess they should pull out of the EU then seeing how they are unable to meet the minimum legal required guarantee. Or does the QC department bin the devices and send the good ones to the EU and the crappy ones to the USA where consumers are used to being screwed over and not have any recourse other than costly legal battles or lawyer enriching class actions which may net them a $15 discount coupon?
Doesn't quite work that way with the EU. When the EU goes after you for violating the law, they go after you properly. None of this lawyer enriching class action bollocks, the EU itself takes you to court and returns the money to its members in deductions and rebates.
Besides Apple wont pull out of the EU, they'll just accept that the phone has a 2 year life in Europe and a 1 year life in the US (unless you buy an extended warranty)... Not like they're the exact same phone, made in the exact same factory, in the exact same part of China or anything.
To be fair, the term was "premium brand," which Apple - arguably - is.
Apple is by far, not a premium brand. Its an expensive one, but not premium. Even then, they're not so expensive as to price themselves out of availability for everyone. Here in the UK even someone on benefits (welfare) can get an Iphone. They're like a Toyota Camry and we can hardly call Toyota a premium brand
However, such a brand can be applied to all kinds of shonky products - Ferrari and Porsche, for example, sell all kinds of branded, over-priced tat.
Right about the first part, wrong about the second.
Ferrari's and Porsches have attributes that set them apart from cheaper competition (although the Porsche is the cheap Ferrari). You cant replicate a 488 for much less than a 488 costs. You cant say the same about Apple. Apple is like what Volkswagen does in Australia. VW pretends its a premium brand in Australia when they're common as muck in here in Europe and no more expensive than a Toyota. They aren't better quality or have better features than their competition, but they charge a premium because of the badge.
My Nexus 6P also can only fast charge on a USB-C charger.
The real news is that the iPhones don't include the cable and fast charger in the box.
My Nexus 5x fast charges from the wall using the cable and charger provided in the box. It also fast charges from a USB 3.0 port, but not as fast as from the wall.
Perhaps you forgot to read even the summary, this is a hardware maker talking about hardware features. IOS updates, however rapidly and widely distributed, are never going to be able to add any of the features listed above.
Yep, when it comes to software features, Apple still hasn't implemented some things Android has had since day 1.
> I also miss food, but that's because I live in England and the closest place for a decent meal is across the channel.
Birmingham is full of very nice Indian restaurants.
Given my present location, France is closer than Birmingham.
What's funny is during the keynote they listed the resolution for landscape while showing the iPhone in portrait orientation.
You seem to be under the impression that an Apple keynote is about passing on useful information and accurate specifications. Please report to your nearest Steve Jobs Memorial iReducation centre.
An Apple keynote is about giving fanboys wank material whilst ignoring that someone else had invented it first.
Samsung S8 has animojis?
Facebook has had them for years. I for one, hope this horrible thing remains a Iphone exclusive for years to come... if not forever.
The funniest thing was them trying to show it off working on stage, and it failed asking him to use his PIN instead because face recognition failed.
Android has had this for some time, you pretty much have two options with trying to use a face as a password. 1. Make it so stringent that it fails 99% of the time, 2. Make is so lax that someone with a different skin colour can pass it.
I believe this was first introduced in Ice Cream Sandwich, which was released in Oct 2011. In the last 6 years, it's never been more than a gimmick.
You can't have it both ways. Really, you can't. Either the car is driving or the person is driving. Expecting that a person will let the car drive AND ALSO stay 100% ready to take over is just not reality.
Because this is emphatically not true is the main reason the Google autonomous car has had only one at fault accident.
Its not that we are incapable of monitoring an autonomous system, we are, in fact there are many careers that mainly consist of watching an autonomous machine doing its thing and stepping in when things go wrong.
The problem is that most people wont. Not because they cant but because they're lazy and marketing has sold them the impression that autonomous cars will do everything for them whilst they sit back faffing about with their phone. This will be a sore disappointment for these people.
And the autopilot in planes saves lives.
Incorrect.
Autopilot combined with pilot saves lives. Dependence on autopilot has demonstrated the opposite effect, as evidenced in Asiana flight 214 and absolutely will not save lives when the pilot orders it to fly into a mountain (Germanwings flight 9525).
The main reason that Google's self driving car has only had one at fault accident is because it had a professional driver who was been paying attention. The next biggest reason is that it's only been tested in sunny California. I'd like to see it on the narrow and mean streets of Aberdeen in winter.
It will be the same with autonomous cars, once idiots get into them and assume that the car does everything for them whilst they pissfart about on their phone we'll see accident rates increase.
People have two mode, driving and not-driving.
Use of the latter mode does not depend on whether the car has any autonomous capabilities.
Here in Norway we just had a general election last night:
Just 2-3 weeks ago Jan T Sanner, the minister with responsibility for elections, decided that every single vote had to be counted manually, including all early voting ballots. Previously those votes had been counted using optical scanners but with the news about how hackable most voting machines have turned out to be, he decided that we won't trust them.
Voting booths closed at 21:00 and the trend (our current prime minister will almost certainly get another 4 years) was immediately clear even though many of the details were less settled. This is mainly due to our voting setup with 169 representatives from 19 counties, where each party is supposed to get a total number which corresponds as closely as possible to the total vote counts, but with a cutoff of 4.0%: If a party gets less than that they will not get any of the final 19 slots which goes to the parties which have gotten too few direct representatives.
This morning at 07:00 we had passed 95% of total votes counted and a couple of the smaller parties had just managed to lift safely above the 4.0% cutoff point, so now the result is for all practical purposes final.
The key idea is that in all countries with "one person - one vote" the effort needed to do a full manual count (which is actually a dual count and verification) is exactly proportional to the size of the country, so it should be just as easy to do this in the US as in Norway!
Terje
Australia had a national election last year, it took over 2 weeks for a leading party to be established as it came down to counting postal votes in many electorates.
That being said, there is nothing wrong with paper votes leaving a verifiable trail. It means that votes can be trusted in cases like the 2016 Australian federal election.
I negotiated three weeks off per year, non-contiguous. Then as soon as I turned 30, I was laid off permanently, and never worked again. I miss food.
I work in a country that protects the rights of its workers. I have 20 days holiday as standard. My employer gives me an additional 5 as part of my salary package, I can purchase another 5 by sacrificing my salary and there are 8 bank holidays (public holidays). I'm 35 and still gainfully employed, many of my colleagues are even older. I also earn more than my US colleagues. I also miss food, but that's because I live in England and the closest place for a decent meal is across the channel.
Sigh, that's meant to be 20 days (4 working weeks).
I negotiated three weeks off per year, non-contiguous. Then as soon as I turned 30, I was laid off permanently, and never worked again. I miss food.
I work in a country that protects the rights of its workers. I have 20 weeks holiday as standard. My employer gives me an additional 5 as part of my salary package, I can purchase another 5 by sacrificing my salary and there are 8 bank holidays (public holidays). I'm 35 and still gainfully employed, many of my colleagues are even older. I also earn more than my US colleagues.
I also miss food, but that's because I live in England and the closest place for a decent meal is across the channel.
Just wait until he tries to demo the animoji thing. Even the emojis will look bored.
Aren't these "Animoji" things pretty much what 19-20 year old Colombian/Filipino girls already send me over Facebook/Whats App? Animated pictures of anthropomorphised bears/cats blowing kisses or heart floating away.
I hope they're incompatible with Android. Realistically I don't want this crap from a 32 yr old man-child fanboy whom I definitely don't want to see sans pants. This is one feature I'd be happy to have as an Iphone exclusive.
So yes, Apple "leaks" things, but as a company that directly or indirectly employs hundreds of thousands of employees, they occasionally actually leak things too, and this DEFINITELY
Came direct from the Marketing department.
These leaks are getting worse because Apple is struggling for relevance in a world where they're now almost beyond passe. This is just an outcry saying "Please, please pretend I'm still relevant". The mere mention of speculation of the hope of a leak before an Apple product announcement used to generate hundreds upon hundreds of comments. Now we can barely get 100 in a whole day and half of those are people saying " Yawn, this was completely expected".
They are "crippling" the batteries to make them last longer which, in cases of emergency, you do not care about. Still, it would be nice if they provided an interface to manage it ourselves instead of acting as mighty god through some kind of mighty galactic, over the air, update.
This, what kills Li-ion batteries quickly is letting them completely discharge. Tesla have to guarantee the life of the battery for X years accounting for the worst abuse that owners can throw at it. They're just following the standard procedure for most automotive manufacturers, build the car to cater for the worst idiot that could own it.
Its not like this kind of thing is unheard of, the fuel gauge consistently lies about being empty because running out of fuel causes problems (especially to diesels) and its designed this way because people are idiots.
The definition of a "SWJ" is someone who advocates social justice, not someone who realizes social justice in their own lives.
No, the definition of SJW is "evil boogeymen" with a side order of "I'm a fuckwit".
This,
SJW is a made up term by people who want to use bigoted arguments but demonise those who would point out their bigotry. It's modern origination comes from gamergate, it was used to try and denigrate those who didn't believe in rampant sexism.
Its taken over from "PC", mainly because PC was used so often as a byword for "something I don't like but cant find a rational argument against" that PC has lost all meaning and impact. SJW will soon go the same way as it gives more negative connotations about it's user, than those it is used against.
Google acquired Motorola Mobility and then sold it off just a couple of years later. Why repeat that move?
First, Motorola was a patent play. Google gained much protection by buying the patent portfolio.
Second, Google's tried the 3rd party vendor route and gotten shit products out of it and continues watching Apple reap 95% of the mobile profit. Pixel was an attempt by Google to create a realistic competitor that would actually help them. Now that the Pixel appears realistic, Google needs more control to keep up with Apple who is ahead in many areas. (Hint, there's a reason besides fanboism that Apple has 95% of the profits)
Google buying HTC outright will have another immediate effect - Samsung's profits. Unless Samsung takes a page out of the same book and creates their own OS dev team and branches Android into their own offering.
The reason Apple makes significant profits (nowhere near 95%) is that they overcharge for everything. The Iphone hardware is 1/5 of the phones cost here in the UK. You can get the same spec from Samsung for less, go for a lesser known brand like Huawei, WileyFox or OnePlus and it's even cheaper. These companies are still making a profit, just not obscene amounts.
Also Samsung has little to worry about from HTC or Google's acquisition of HTC.
Now the real reason Google are buying HTC is because HTC are in dire straights financially and that makes it the perfect time to acquire them.
Shouldn't people be allowed to take vacations? I have no problem with this.
Whilst your company is going down the tubes, you're damn straight an exec should not be on holiday. But hey, at least this guy is consistent, consistently a douche-bag, but consistent.
Is /. social media?
Also... what counts as news?
I get a lot of car news via facebook. New model releases, updates, spectacular crashes, so on and so forth from various sites I've subscribed to. Every now and then you even get something news worthy through that no-one else picked up on like that time a few million quid of Jaguar/Land Rover engines got stolen. The Daily Mail and their ilk were too busy with a massive story in France where SOMEONE IN A BURKA stole a hundred Euro to bother with a piffling story such as millions of pounds of JLR engines being brazenly stolen in broad daylight.
A lot of my friends get their sporting news from FB although like me, for serious news they'll generally go to a legitimate source like the BBC for national and world events.
I'm not surprised people are turning to facebook and Twitter for their news, just look at the shite published in something like the Sun. Clickbait headline, Celebrity Gossip, Page3 girl (basically soft porn, for those on the other side of the pond), more celebrity gossip, clearly biased political story, possibly another Page 3 girl, clickbait sports headline. It's little wonder fake news has become indistinguishable from actual news, people have been force fed it from tabloid rags for decades now.
But I digress, does it really matter that a lot of people now get their sports updates and celeb goss from Facebook and Twitter instead of ESPN and E!? I think a better question is, how many people get all their news from social media and how many dont fact check?
Since the presidency of the EU is not "big government", it's literally just a rotating position that gives countries an opportunity to propose an agenda. Estonia has pissed it's opportunity away by proposing something that seems to violate the human rights of EU citizens (the right to privacy in particular) and which has no hope of ever being adopted or even influencing the legislation.
Before you complain about the EU, note that it has some of the strongest privacy protections in the world. They have been used to stop government spying, they have been used to force massive multinational companies like Google to respect individual privacy. And those are actual, written and enforced law, not some random proposal that has zero chance of ever being enacted.
This.
In a free, democratic parliament you can propose any law you like, no matter how stupid. Proposing a law does not guarantee it'll pass.