Curently experiencing that...
... with Star Wars the Old Republic, worked fine in Beta, release version though is terrible, best frame rate I can get is 18 on an ATI chip. Playable, but waiting for the driver/game update.
1524 publicly visible posts • joined 5 Apr 2007
I think the PC Makers made a hash of it because they could do the hardware ok but probably took longer figuring out the minefield of implementing Android. If Microsoft had Win8 there and then, I think it could have been a slightly different story.
I get the impression from the tablets that appeared shortly after the iPad that they were thrown together to jump on that bandwagon and the logical choice for an OS was Android as they thought it was the easier implementation for lack of something better.
I reckon it's the real deal, it looks like it's been sort of bolted back together again, so if they did take control of it, they might of only got control of he flight surfaces and maybe landing gear was not an option.
Judging by the Americans refusing to comment I think they are worried to say the least as I'm pretty sure the Chinese will end up being the highest bidder. These things would probably make a great stealthy nuke delivery system with a bit of modification.
... I have a laptop bag (sorry can't remember the manufacturers name and it's not with me today), they had a very roomy bag with lots of pockets and even an extra pull out pocket (A4 size) with more pockets on it. Padding around the laptop was good and also a combination of airpockets in the padding. The laptop slot also had soem adjustments on it so that you could make it a nice snug fit for 15" and lower.
I think the thing that got me about this one was that it came with it's own asset stickers that you could put on the laptop and then register on their site, shoudl your laptop every get lost at an Airport it could easily be returned, the company would arrange pickup and delivery. I will find out the manufacturer and post it here once I get home in case anyone is interested.
I see microsoft rolled out it's dashboard update yesterday along with creating space for the ondemand and TV streaming services it has signed up with. I did notice that the Sky 'app' on Xbox now allows you to stream live TV, it also gives you the Sky Guide for selecting which channel you want in essence turning your Xbox into a more portable Sky box. Although I didn't check to see if they have gone that extra step by making it a Sky+ type system to record programs onto your xbox harddisk.
That's why contracts have caveats, means you can say things like 'Global' but then add 'with the exception of Chinese Territories'.
I wonder if it was blind luck on the Chinese companies part, or some canny thinking that led to this moment.... "Yeah sell it for 35,000, cause we know we'll have a the ability to sting them later, once their product has gather momentum".
From what I've read about this I get the see a lot of people referring to 'logs' or 'logging' but that's not what is essentially happening as per the video. The CIQ app isn't creating that log that was shown in the video, that was the event 'stream' that the phone was producing and the app was keeping an eye on the 'stream' whilst using it's real-time filtering at the same time, when it's sees an event that it needs for analytical purposes it catches it from the stream and saves what it needs into this 200kb file for transmission. So the all of that event stream in the video is what the phone is producing the app is just dipping in to it.
It's the carriers that need to be taken to task over this not carrier IQ, just because someone makes a gun doesn't mean I have to use it.
... but in a galaxy far, far away. That was a sweeping generalisation so easy on the flames fanboi's.
I did enjoy the beta, after firing up a Sith Warrior on Friday night my aim was to get a starship before my last opportunity to play on Monday night. Although that was a bit of an anticlimax as I was expecting slightly more freedom with my ship, instead it's planet to planet travel and missions are 'on rails', still enjoyable though.
I know it's not exactly the same but the game engine is very similiar and the reason for that is probably because BioWare looked at successful business models for MMO's and what works and clearly thought Blizzard have got a majority of right as it's pulling the customers so lets do similiar. Also the fact that all the keyboard shortcuts being exactly the same will help any WoW player transition over to this one. (I'm looking at my budget to see if I can afford to run both together, I may have to play them alternate months).
The biggest difference between the 2 was probably that I found more drawn in by the quest dialogue but then you would when the camera locks you in, you can do nothing else other than watch and wait for your interaction point. Plus I know more about SW universe, despite the fact that I have been playing WoW for 7 odd years.
I wasn't worried by the graphics glitches and the fact that most of the character animations hadn't been enabled (WoW was the same in it's beta, along with a few other MMO's that have been in Beta).
I think a previous poster was right in the fact that a lot will draw comparsions with WoW, especially seeing as the game engine is virtually the same (including all the keyboard shortcuts) and the fact that WoW is currently the leader in monthly paid MMO's.
..."Facebook is a piece of free trivia."
I know exactly what your saying but trust me there are people out there that think of it as life and limb, when they get to that state of mind, money is not as much of a barrier to them whether they have it or not.
I'm gonna do you all favour now and shut up, I seem to have got a bit passionate about this cause it's touched on socialeconomics and technology and it facinates me.
Sorry I should have said I was only referring to those that would struggle to pay for a sub, those that won't struggle to pay it will probably quite happily fork out the cash if they aren't going to notice it.
I reckon honest budgeting is more of a priority for more than it was a couple of years ago. Chatting to a professor in socioeconomics said that these sort of economical times you see a lot of 'middle class' folk suddenly drop straight into the 'lower class' most folks who were comfortable a few years back with their lifestyle expense are now finding it a little harder with increased prices from fuel to food and the analogy of 'most people are only 1 paycheque away from living on the streets' seems a lot more real nowadays. I know a few people that have decided to drop a gym subscription or maybe trim their sky bill by ditching movies or sport.
I think the other point you made 'Even if they are breaking the bank, there's not much money there.' Corporates don't care how you will be able to afford it they just want you to pay it, if they can get you hooked how you keep your habit going is of no concern to them.
P.S. liked the typo as well ;-)
P.P.S From what I've read Second Life degenerated into a virtual fetish club by the sounds of it.
... a lot of people seem to be forgetting a few factors.
If FB started charging, I can gaurantee it would be at a level that they knew would be affordable to the majority, because if they can keep the majority they already have then subscription can be based on economies of scale (e.g. 50million users at £5 or 25million at £2.50).
Also those that can't afford to budget for this expense might still try and break the bank to pay it as they have already 'invested' a lot of their time and effort into the platform (e.g. uploading images, posts, online games etc). It will take a hefty, uncomfortable subscription for these types of users to cut free from FB and loose all that net-estate behind.
Plus you have the addicts who can't leave it because they have now fully intergrated social media into their daily lives, which is what most social media platforms want, they want and market themselves as essential, once they are essential it's easier to but a price on it.
@Andrew, good article, I think you have highlighted the elephant in the room that everyone deep down wishes wasn't there, you can slap a horn on it if you want and call it an ellehorn if it helps fit in with your analogies.
"...The first and most glaringly idiotic presumption is that any of these services are necessary in people's lives. They did just fine without any of these services 10-15 years ago and will do just as fine if they happen to be priced out of their want..."
You don't really understand human nature that well do you? I'm sure simliar arguments were made about the mobile phone in it's early days, you know that device, the one that is an essential part of the majorities lives today whether they can afford it or not.
... so your comment doesn't make a whole lot of sense. If you're paying a subscription fee for one FB clone and some of your mates are on another, market forces dictate that the platforms will need to start competing with each other so interoberability should come into play. Just like some IM platforms are doing now. Back in the day if you were on MSN Messenger but your mate was on Yahoo, you had to have both platform apps loaded, that is no longer the case.
The other point you had about one being free and one being paid, today human nature is a funny thing. One comparing to identical services together where one is paid and the other is free, most (note the 'most') people will instinctively be wary of the free platform so they will compare the 2 offerings in greater detail, at which point if the paid service sub isn't too high it will usually offer more than the free service and the paid for service wins out. Plus the other caveat being that a paid service usually is stronger has they have the budget to throw at main stream marketing channels.
No, not unaware, fully aware that they were all privatised. I was merely considering the possibility of giving them a financial boost so that we could remove the arguement that they have to spent so much money on their infrastructure upgrades to comply with EU laws & directives and maybe that could translate into a financial difference to the customer as we will never win the argument about energy trading on the futures market, which at times really works hard against us.
... can I hope that when using that word they will bung some money to the Grid for water, gas and electric, prehaps helping these out, reducing leaks, out of date equipment might help with efficiencies that could save THE CUSTOMER (you know the public, the ones paying this dosh twice over already in taxes etc) some money.
oh hell, I might as well go the whole hog and say something unbeliveably ridiculous.... when is the Governement going to do something for us, the general public?
... haven't really looked at the market. I think it's a bit optimistic as these sort of offerings are already present on the platform and they don't seem to be neck-deep in customers yet, prehaps it's a slow burn and ROI will come in a couple of years time. Although if I were a VC I would want a gauranteed ROI in a year seeing as it's in the Mobile sector which can be a fical beast.
... it's the companies policy that's usually the problem, that and some untrustworthy employees who will doss around all day not doing much giving the rest of us a bad name.
Personally I'm all for home working, I do it once a week and because I've agreed to to my set hours and no more at some point in the day I get to mix working a bit and playing with my son before he grows up too quick and isn't interested so much in his Dad.
... create a killer facebook app that pull data across, like posts and pictures etc and get it to interact with twitter. Give it an angle like hootsuite and they could wipe out the need to access Facebook directly.
Nobody like duplicating data especially when's that data is verbal diahorea about what you've been up to.
"...it is the world's first piece of kit to display images without the use of a screen..." really?
I'm pretty sure I saw many years back a device that projected a free floating image using water vapour/mist, from what I remember it was a German guy that developed it, I think he was even quoted as saying that he was developing 'hotspots' so that the image could be interactive.
(I may have even seen it on El Reg, clarification needed)
Worse than that, as a local authority we have even more reason to make sure our info is on the website first. With nigh on 160,000 residents not all of them will have internet access and those that do will not all want to sign up to Facebook or even look at it. But what do I know, I'm just the monkey that pushes buttons, it's not like I've been working in this field for the last 15yrs.
... as it's forcing you to sign up with Facebook, this is the whole reason the 'No Purchase Nessecary' label was brought into play so as to not alienate anyone and make it fair and open to all.
(Hence why I'm constantly battling my manager who thinks everything needs to go on Facebook first and I'm always saying website first, that is and always will be our primary source of information).
...Linkedin is a social media channel based on businesses and colleagues and such like associations.
Facebook is not so much that but it has been used for that by various employees, just to make it worse you can now get your FB to feed into your Linkedin profile (talk about setting your own minefield).
So in short AC is bang on the nail, don't mention who you work for just be generic and refer to your 'employer'.
It is worrying that the judge isn't being challenged on this but you do have to feel slightly pleased as someone has just been liberated from a cult :-P
I have exactly the same issue on a Wednesday, productivity slows down so much that a good day is considered as being able to read an item on the staff intranet and send a couple of emails. Good forbid I even think about firing up Photoshop.
Thankfully as I'm in complete control of my home network, all the kit gets checked last thing at night and on a staggered shedule so as not to interfere with my bandwidth more than anything else.
I see your point about the iUsers vs 'Droidusers when paying for apps, shame as I have bought a few droid apps (AV being one of them) and found the whoel purchase experience easy to use. I wonder if that will change over time as I have seen a lot more quality apps appearing on the Droid marketplace now compared to a few months ago when it mostly free crap not worth installing.
(Nuke icon as I think that is what happens to our network on a Virus Wednesday)
"Welcome to the new world of mobile, same as the old world of desktop?" I think that last remark says it all for me.
I have AV software on my PC and likewise I have AV software on my Android devices, none of these devices suffer from performance issues because of it and I treat my phone like I do my PC when it comes to security, downloading and installing what looks safe based on reputation and reviews and number of downloads etc. Bit of common sense from those wild west days of the PC.
I do wonder how long the market will react taking this into account, what with samsung shifting more units that Apple and general Android saturation being higher than iPhones, how long before there are less apps developed for Apple first (if at all in some cases) as developers concentrate on the higher saturated platform, only time will tell I suppose.
... I think every company wants their competitor out of their respective market, less competition means more sales for you business. So in essence yes Apple do want Samsung out of the market along with every other mobile manufacturer.
Don't be fooled the IP dispute is all about disrupting Samsung's business and revenues, it is the foremost reason for taking the action they have.
"...considering how well Facebook has developed business integration." I must have nodded off for a few months, has Facebook provided new tools and really understood how businesses want to use Facebook or is it still botching stuff together so that it looks like it knows what it's doing. I hate to say it but Facebook need to contract Apple to help with UI design.