Posts by Tom 13

Re: Because OS updates.

Given the customization that usually accompanies using an ARM processor, I wouldn't count on Ubuntu being able to push those updates any faster than Android. For the most part the bottleneck is the vendor, not Google.

Re: Microsoft poured millions into making popular apps

Microsoft has an image problem. They were branded a monopolist back in the 90s after which they've behaved in such a way as to deserve the branding. It doesn't matter how much they spend on developing apps for something new. People have stuck with Windows on desktops because that's pretty much been all that's out there, (No Apple doesn't count because Apple behave even more as monopolists than MS. They just don't have the market share to run afoul of the US or EU legal eagles.) but there's no way in HELL they're going to extend that monopoly beyond the desktop-server environment.

Incidentally, they're behaving the same way with respect to Google. They accepted them for the search and free mail market, but they flopped when they tried to move into Social Media via Google+. Their only somewhat successful move there has been buying an existing social media venue in the form of YouTube.

Re: On what merit will they be trying to convice the users ?

If the compelling reason for iOS and Android is the well developed applications market, and the Ubuntu phone is a full Ubuntu OS, that problem has already been solved with the application set available to Ubuntu. The only reason iOS and Android need the market shops is because they DIDN'T have that to start with.

Unless of course the Penguinistas out there are telling such absolutely huge whoppers even $Hrillary would be embarrassed to tell them. While some of them are a bit fanatical, lying isn't one of those things I regard as one of their typical faults.

Re: can overwrite exiting Android OS

That's essentially impossible. Too many variations in the ARM chips in the phone. This is a manufacturers only game.

Re: My point was that there are people targetting Linux for their malware

And his point makes yours irrelevant: in the broader market the people running desktops aren't as security aware as the people running critical infrastructure on *nix servers.

At this point there are three things protecting *nix systems:

1) Being somewhat more difficult to install and maintain* than Windows or Apple systems they've been maintained for people who care more about security than similar people running those systems.

2) A smaller market share which makes it less attractive to attack it.

3) A high degree of fragmentation in that smaller market share which again makes it less attractive to attack because even if you can infect Ubuntu it's 50/50 for say Red Hat.

*Remember MS had difficulty convincing users to click a button once a month, so they've switched to a default setting that enables it automatically.

Re: Security Theatre

Can we get some eagles with Frickin' laser beams?

Re: everyone speaks perfect English.

As I recall, when India first gained its independence, one of the first things they tried to do was throw out English as the official language because it smacked too much of colonialism. Then they discovered the only way the various regions could talk to one another was in English. So they kept it. I mean, you might like the Germans manage to construct High Indie out of the various dialects (more numerous than they were in Germany) but you'd then have a language nobody knew and everybody would have to learn. Much easier to just stick with English, (Even if it is a bitch to learn since we've imported from damn near every other language on the planet without regularizing things. And that's BEFORE you get to the differences between British and 'Merkin English.)

Re: Hang on....

If FB can buy off the far wealthier US, India was chump change.

Not that I expect logical consistency from the sort of progtards who chant that mantra.

Re: Are Indians too stupid to be trusted with free Internet?

Like their richer western counterparts, probably not.

However, like their richer western counterparts, their regulators may well be.

Re: However, this CEO needs his head examined.

And whatever legal eagle gave him a stamp of approval.

I expect if VTech gets challenged in court, the judge will declare them invalid as fast as the ink on the page dries.

Re: how people can mislay 5 tons of cotton.

It's easy. They accidentally shipped it to the warehouse with the Saturn V engines.

Re: single product called Excess?

Well, that was the point at which Ballmer's brain cells gave their all at providing him with a coherent thought and he realized the joke was on him. Sadly it was the last time they ever did that.

@noj

Even if it were a rant, I don't think we could fault you for it.

In fact, after reading this article and making my first post, I'm going to seriously think about picking up an account I own again. I had one back in the days of dial up because it came with the dial up service. Maybe it's time for me to start breaking the Google chains.

Re: what other choices are there?

The one we've all been avoiding: paying a reasonable rate for your email account.

There are some companies out there that sell them. Install Thunderbird and they'll offer you at least two choices.

Re: there's been much more spam.

I didn't notice. But then my Yahoo account is the one I use for "email address is required" whenever I'm completing one of those registration forms and I expect it will generate spam.

So I suppose you could say I'm part of their problem.

Re: You haven't done any regular AV removal clean ups have you?

Actually I have. Scanning in a set aside PC was deprecated as unworkable about 8 years ago.

These days the exploit kits are too available and too complex. Even using five different products to scan in such a detached system doesn't ensure there isn't anything left in the machine that will reinfect it. In the time you run those 3 or 5 or 7 scans, you can image a new system. Moving data is at your own risk.

The other thing to remember is that while they are now a security company, that's NOT how they started. It started as one guy who was automating some fixes he routinely applied for friends and family.

Yeah, they should have had time to clean it up into professional code. But given how much professional code is crap that needs cleaned up the same way....

Re: All these firms pay tax somewhere however

Here we get to the only point the freetards are actually correct about. Given all of the current special deals, it is possible to keep the money floating in International Space so that it never gets taxed. Apple in particular have been VERY good at that. Which isn't to say other multi-nationals have been slackers.

Now, that means the money isn't directly available to the shareholders either. In order to make it available to them, you'd have to bring it into the country and pay the tax on it. So far this has been okay with the shareholders because the stock value has appreciated based on the money held in international suspension.

This strikes me as a reasonably fair situation. So long as the freetards demand too much money from the actual producers, they don't get it. As soon as they set reasonable rates, the money will come home.

Re: unless you first harmonize service provision and expenditure.

That wasn't nice. Using logic or facts damages their precious egos.

Re: rapidly kill business in troubles

Businesses in trouble ought to be killed rapidly and replaced with ones that aren't. Much of our current economic malaise is attributable to the fact that progtards such as yourself have inhibited this process for far too long.

Re: a small business in say Germany

Simples. If there is an applicable import tax, that gets payed at the point of import. Otherwise, the guy in the UK who sells it collects the tax and pays it.

Yes that does mean you'll have to work through distributors and resellers. That's what they are there for. If you want to cut them out, you have to foot the bill for following the law.

Re: Get rid of corporation tax...

You'll never get that one past the freetards.

Sales taxes put an effective limit of about 10% on how much those who like to spend other people's money can take. That's way too low to satisfy their envy.

Re: morally should be paid

Morally, companies OUGHT to seek to minimize the amount the tax leeches take from the people working to make things. Sounds to me like Google's doing a good job of that.

Re: Cash less society will never happen

With the appropriate smoke screens from the lawyers, you can do it all electronically in larger amounts and still have the IRS take their cut where applicable. Which reduces the risk you lose an election for being caught taking a little brown bag.

Re: give around 30 days interest free advances

Those 30 day "free" advances are being paid for by the blokes who are making minimum payments and are periodically late with their payments by a day or two.

Now if you're the sort who thing the poor and the stupid should make life easier for you, you won't have a problem with that. But don't go blaming the greedy banks for stealing from the poor for your benefit.

Re: We used to have a law against usury.

It's a problem of quanta. It costs some amount of money to process any request, say $25. No matter how small the transaction you HAVE to recover the $25, even if its $100 for only a week. Yes, that leads to absurd percentage rates. That's why if you need $100 for a week you're best borrowing it from a mate, or better yet, just not buying whatever it was you THOUGHT you needed.

Full disclosure: my roomie routinely makes $1000 payday type loans to a friend at no interest.

Re: was outside the regular banking systems.

As the vendor you should still have the receipts. And the receipts should be sufficient to sue council for payment.

Re: How do you prove

The receipts you kept for each transaction.

Re: They're doing it wrong.

I've never seen a festival system where the credit cards worked as quickly or robustly as cash. The first obstacle is frequently the connection itself. In a brick and mortar store this will be a fast wired connection that has probably been configured for months. Festival vendors usually wind up on wireless. Even if it isn't wireless, having just been set up there are likely to be connection issues. And that's before you get to potential power issues and training the temp staff to handle cards. In the US, you also get time for the signature.

Re: very hard to verify a cashless system.

No it's not. The key element of verifying the transactions is that the cash matches the receipts not that the double count matches. Cashless transactions still have the receipts, and should still retain enough of the account number to uniquely identify the missing transactions.

Where cashless loses businesses money is when the card holder claims the charge is bogus and the vendor no longer has the record to prove otherwise, or it simply isn't worth the cost to challenge it.

Re: There's a good and a bad side to this

My weekly grocery bill is $200. With your plan, I'd need a full wallet just to pay my grocery bill.

Your plan sucks.