idiocracy user interface

rofl @ user interface on that thing

i think that interface makes a nice 3rd pane to this comparison:

http://acousticmonster.com/wp-content/gallery/cache/76__400x425_windowsidiocracy.png

unfortunately it's not over yet...

"ACTA" as such might be dead and buried but its contents is risen back copypasta-style in the form of CETA and TPP:

see

https://www.eff.org/deeplinks/2012/10/ceta-replicates-acta

https://www.eff.org/issues/tpp

i wish i could mod the article insightful +1

"Only to the size of the hammer," - this is my rule too :)

from Jan 2013 you can only get unlocking with a carrier's permission

i think your interpretation of the new DMCA extemptions is a bit flawed: true, unlocking is still freely allowed BUT that will last ONLY UNTIL January 2013. After that you must have the carrier's permission (and assistance) to do so:

quote:

No more unlocking

In 2006 and 2010, the Librarian of Congress had permitted users to unlock their phones to take them to a new carrier. Now that's coming to an end. While the new rules do contain a provision allowing phone unlocking, it comes with a crippling caveat: the phone must have been "originally acquired from the operator of a wireless telecommunications network or retailer no later than ninety days after the effective date of this exemption."

In other words, phones you already have, as well as those purchased between now and next January, can be unlocked. But phones purchased after January 2013 can only be unlocked with the carrier's permission.

/quote

source:

http://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/2012/10/jailbreaking-now-legal-under-dmca-for-smartphones-but-not-tablets/

stock trades list - is this a slow fire sale or what's going on?

the actual URL in the article should be this one:

Westergren Timothy: Insider Trading and Stock Options:

http://www.secform4.com/insider-trading/1522489.htm

that shows the monthly trades much more clearly and by looking at what the other executives of the company are doing it seems this kind of slow fire sale ("under the radar") is "normal" for them:

.

Conrad Thomas:

http://www.secform4.com/insider-trading/1522484.htm

.

Costin Delida:

http://www.secform4.com/insider-trading/1522485.htm

.

Trimble John:

http://www.secform4.com/insider-trading/1522488.htm

.

CAKEBREAD STEVEN:

http://www.secform4.com/insider-trading/1254015.htm

.

KAVNER ROBERT M:

http://www.secform4.com/insider-trading/1195065.htm

.

anyone has any clue what's happening here? From what i know executives selling stock (and stock options) in the company they manage happens usually only once a year or so. Doing this monthly and in such high volumes smells weird to me.

64Gb flash = +200 usd?!!!

wtf... price games again:(

they're practically selling 64Gb of flash memory for +200 usd?

a heavy duty usb flash drive is half of that and it also includes a sturdy rubber enclosure that you can drive a truck over or dump into water 50m deep and it will protect it. Try that with their phone.

tapes

after they migrate the data from the tapes, recycle the tapes themselves to launch a new line of designer clothes and wearable accessories.

It's way more profitable than dumping the tapes in a landfill and it gives a new life to the stuff.

cheating the system

does this thing do any sort of chemical analysis of the liquid it's subjected to?

if not... just bring a [section of a] garden hose into the bathroom, connect one end to a water tap at the nearby sink, open the water flow and use the other end to obtain the gold pee medal :P

"its investigators arrived in New Zealand, copied seven hard drives, and sent the information back to the US without local police knowing what was happening"

Soooo.... copying copyrighted information is theft when MPAA says it is, but copying copyrighted information that belongs to someone else is not theft when the FBI does it on the sly in a foreign country while acting as MPAA's lap dog?

i'm in the same porting hell with Vodafone ever since 2009 !!!!

i'm stuck in a similar porting hell with Vodafone (in Romania) since 2009 and they won't do ANYTHING about it.

in october 2009 i ported my number from Vodafone to another carrier (RDS DigiMobil) and to this day i CANNOT RECEIVE any international call or sms.

i tested with a friend in Canada: while we were both on skype video chat i had him call my mobile phone number from his mobile phone and after he started to get a ringing tone (and my phone wasn't ringing at all) i used the very same phone that he was trying to reach to call his home land line number.

His landline started to ring immediately and at the same time his mobile phone was still trying to ring my mobile number (and did a very good job of faking the ringing, there was no indication that the call was not connected properly at all, he was hearing a standard ringing tone)

i filed complaints all the way up to the National Authority for Communications but all my complaints end up in the same stink-hole that is vodafone+rds support.

RDS says that the porting has been completed from their end... Vodafone says the same and i'm stuck with having to use a secondary prepaid sim card (from vodafone since they won't unlock that handset even if the contract is finished) so that i can receive international calls and sms.

China trademarks =/= Hong Kong trademarks

Proview is not using the fraud and deceit defense in China because these are really two separate legal matters:

The international lawsuits are related to the INTERNATIONAL (actually 10-countries) usage of the mark that was sold to a buyer that was acting under false pretenses and thus it is the contract to the international mark that is contested and as such that contract might be found null and void because of willfull deceit on part of the buyer and Proview might end up actually owning the international IPAD trade mark again if the courts decide so.

The China lawsuit is another kettle of fish: the international right for the mark does not include the rights for Chinese mainland.

Harris & Moure on their blog, http://www.chinalawblog.com/ have repeatedly stressed the point that Hong Kong trademarks are not always (i.e. almost never) recognized in mainland China unless they are also REGISTERED in China.

This is due to the "One country, two systems" approach. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/One_country,_two_systems

See:

http://www.chinalawblog.com/2007/07/china_trademarks_do_you_feel_l.html

and

http://www.chinalawblog.com/2011/12/china_and_foreign_trademarks_think_puerto_rico.html

virustotal apps, secunia psi & filehippo updater

1) VirusTotal.com - the uploader and browser extension tools

https://www.virustotal.com/documentation/desktop-applications/

right click on any file (up to 20mbytes) - send to - virustotal

will scan that file with all their installed antivirus programs

the browser extension helps with scanning unknown links, scans downloads before saving the file, and so on...

https://www.virustotal.com/documentation/browser-extensions/

btw, i chose not to use the browser extensions, i don't want too many addons in firefox, i'm only using the uploader app.

.

.

2) filehippo's update checker and Secunia PSI

http://www.filehippo.com/updatechecker/

https://secunia.com/vulnerability_scanning/personal/

these two complement each other quite well. Sometimes (*ahem*... often) PSI lags a bit on the detection of the latest version available but filehippo's manual tool picks it up.

PSI is best to leave running all the time in the tray since it can auto-update quite a few odd programs (irfan view, adobe flash..), prompt the user for updates for other programs that cannot be auto-updated (no silent install available for them: winamp, vlc,..).

PSI will also warn about end of life programs - programs that their producer has decided to no longer support because newer versions are available - such is the case with sysinternals' registry monitor and file monitor that have been retired and replaced by process monitor.

well, i assume that at least he'll be paying those 35% properly instead of the creative accounting that Mitt Romney is using so that he's only paying 13,9% tax on his millions

http://www.thedailyshow.com/watch/tue-january-24-2012/indecision-2012---i-know-what-you-did-last-quarter

Windows Phone OS = dead in the water

nokia & ms are taking a nosedive recently since MS announced a few days ago that all updates of WinPhone OS will be provided by CARRIERS only

http://windowsteamblog.com/windows_phone/b/windowsphone/archive/2012/01/06/new-maintenance-release-for-windows-phone.aspx

you won't get access to updates directly from MS unless your carrier says so and they won't say so because they don't make any money from a free os update, their interest is to push you to PAY and change your phone... this is a quote from a comment there:

<quote>

They have no intentions on rolling out the update.

They very kindly asked me if I (and for that matter the other 3 members of my family who have the same phones) would like to terminate our contracts and get shiny new Nokia phones where they would be pushing the update out on to at a cost of £350.00 per phone which makes a stagering total of £1400.

</endquote>

napalm pudding!

"Plan B was much the same, the only difference being they were tossed, flaming into the offices concerned."

rofl, great use of a napalm / molotov pudding... tasty AND sticky incendiary device :D

lawsuit incoming in 3....2....1.....

limiting warranties to less than two years will not pass in Europe, here the minimum mandatory warranty period is 2 years as stated in Directive 1999/44/EC and adopted as such in the legislation of the Member Nations

====

(17) Whereas it is appropriate to limit in time the period during which the seller is liable for any lack of conformity which exists at the time of delivery of the goods; whereas Member States may also provide for a limitation on the period during which consumers can exercise their rights, provided such a period does not expire within two years from the time of delivery; whereas where, under national legislation, the time when a limitation period starts is not the time of delivery of the goods, the total duration of the limitation period provided for by national law may not be shorter than two years from the time of delivery;

(...)

Article 5 - Time limits

1. The seller shall be held liable under Article 3 where the lack of conformity becomes apparent within two years as from delivery of the goods. If, under national legislation, the rights laid down in Article 3(2) are subject to a limitation period, that period shall not expire within a period of two years from the time of delivery.

=====

this minimum term of two years is further highlighted by a common letter of the Commission and European Parliament from 2007

http://ec.europa.eu/consumers/cons_int/safe_shop/guarantees/CSD_2007_EN_final.pdf

====

TIME LIMITS – ARTICLE 5(1)

The seller is liable under Article 3 where the lack of conformity becomes apparent within two years as from the moment of delivery.

====

Also, article 7 of Directive 1999/44/EC has this to say:

====

Binding nature

1. Any contractual terms or agreements concluded with the seller before the lack of conformity is brought to the seller's attention which directly or indirectly waive or restrict the rights resulting from this Directive shall, as provided for by national law, not be binding on the consumer.

Member States may provide that, in the case of second-hand goods, the seller and consumer may agree contractual terms or agreements which have a shorter time period for the liability of the seller than that set down in Article 5(1). Such period may not be less than one year.

====

please note that warranties of one year are acceptable only for second-hand goods.

I'm sooo looking forward to the day when the European Class Action lawsuits (called "collective redress") can finally be launched at such sellers/manufacturers.

http://ec.europa.eu/consumers/redress_cons/collective_redress_en.htm

in case of fire, break the glass. ALL of it :p

3 hours/day?

who uses lighting bulbs only 3 hours/day? who made up this crazy metric?

if it's clouded or very foggy outside we even keep the lights on during the entire day and sometimes well past midnight

my opinion: it looks like a hairy spinning ball :p

adobe cancels development of flash for mobile devices

http://www.zdnet.com/blog/perlow/exclusive-adobe-ceases-development-on-mobile-browser-flash-refocuses-efforts-on-html5/19226

rofl... adobe punches nvidia right when it launches the tegra 3 platform.

nuked logo for ovious reasons

wtf, ANOTHER delay and expensive as hell?

Spring 2012?????? another delay?

at the beginning of summer they promised us that in it will BE AVAILABLE by the end of this year, and the trade shows i've attended they promised us that it will be available in november! why this delay again?

see: https://secure.flickr.com/photos/panasonictoughbook/sets/72157626971296012/

also,

£1K for the 3g version and £875 for non-3g? are they nuts? £125 just for an additional 3g modem tucked inside?

f**k it then, i'm getting samsung devices for our company. Panasonic can go suck on an egg.

Nokia - disconnecting people

... from their jobs

The title is required, and must contain letters and/or digits

woot, we finally free of the old "The title is required, and must contain letters and/or digits"

//beer icon for obvious reasons :)

push that button! ooops.. not THAT one! **screen cracks**

those gamers that are used to really squeeze the plastic buttons of the console will find that they WILL get a broken display on this one.

Sony should see failure mode coming... i don't think that there is anyone who didn't press really hard on one button or another at least once in their lifetime during a really captivating game. Even if i'm super careful that button arrangement is just asking for trouble. Do that with this display and you're guaranteed to break the screen. Can you spell "not covered by warranty"? i can!

not all Europe, just a few countries

as Florian Mueller says on his blog, the ruling only applies in Germany, Ireland, Sweden, Switzerland, UK and Netherlands.

http://fosspatents.blogspot.com/2011/08/dutch-court-orders-eu-wide-preliminary.html

It does not apply in Austria, Belgium, Czech Republic, Estonia, Greece, Iceland, Italy, Latvia, Lithuania, Portugal, Romania, Slovenia, Slovakia, and Spain because in those countries Apple has abandoned the patent registration process mid-way and it lapsed.

quote from INPADOC LEGAL status: EP 2059868 (A2) for those countries:

LAPSED BECAUSE OF FAILURE TO SUBMIT A TRANSLATION OF THE DESCRIPTION OR TO PAY THE FEE WITHIN THE PRESCRIBED TIME-LIMIT

HP grabs tantō, performs seppuku ...

instead of nuking webOS it would be better imho to just release it as an open-source project... maybe this way android could use some bits from it and HP would get to use it for (a potential) future tablet.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Seppuku#Ritual

too bad...

too bad that "It's a Sony" because they'll eventually screw all their customers "like.no.other" and will "make.believe." that OtherOS removal, CD Rootkits, etc never happened

facebook sms auth catch-22

i got locked out of my fb account because i have login approval required via phone but no phone number defined on profile!!!!!!

This happened because i deleted my phone number from my public profile but i didnt mean to also delete it from the login security section. However, when i changed my public profile, their stupid site also deleted the phone number from the security login approval section too, while keeping active the mandatory login approval via sms.

That results in a catch-22 scenario, i cannot login until i get a sms with an auth code, but i cannot get the code since there's no phone number listed to send the sms to.

Since there's no phone number left to send sms to, and i don't currently have a device that's already authorized (i run ccleaner weekly to clear cookies and other stuff) that effectively means their system gives me no other way to recover my account and they get to sit on and steal my private data without letting me have any say in it.

At least with Google's 2-factor auth sms security i have some printed recovery codes i can use, but they didn't give me any recovery codes to print.

And they dont want to turn off the mandatory sms auth (or restore the previous phone number or convert it to email-based auth) for accounts that no longer have a phone number listed. It's impossible to send a sms to a non-existing number.

As to my government-issued id, i'm NOT going to send that, because OF COURSE i didn't use the name that the government uses for me but i used the name most of my friends know me by.

reuters news late by about 3 WEEKS

the reuters story has been scooped 3 WEEKS ago by Charlie D.

http://semiaccurate.com/2011/06/27/apple-cpus-rolling-off-the-line-at-tsmc/

hint: june 27th

NOT!

they got it wrong, their greatest enemy is NOT old windows, it's their own stupid mandatory "genuine checks" that they perform as a condition to obtaining updates. This in turn leads to obsolete software sticking around for ages.

Not my case but i get calls and i know a lot of people that simply DO NOT WANT TO USE windows/microsoft update AT ALL on their home computers because of that. They simply CANNOT afford to pay the bank-breaking fee (for them) that MS is demanding!

If the genuine check was just a gentle reminder in the tray that would pop out once a day they could live with it, BE SECURE and one day they might get a proper license when/if they can afford it but noooo, MS wants to mess with their desktop settings, stick them with old&insecure windows files and so on.

That's why in these cases i always carry an Ubuntu live cd around with me and most people LOVE it when they see what it can do and that it can be installed and updated without intrusive "genuine" checks.

Ubuntu (as almost any other linux distro there) does perform some "genuine" checks but it does so in the background just to make sure that the updates it downloads have not been altered after they were signed with the distro GPG key.

Also, roughly half of the people i introduce to Ubuntu decide to keep it and ditch windows completely.

no 3g/hsdpa modem?

would it have killed them if they included a 3s/hsdpa modem built-in and leave me a slot to add a sim card? the bill of materials increase for an additional internal 3g modem is usually less than about 10 euro each when purchased bulk.

I don't want to mess with an external usb modem on a small portable device because it tends to snag on all kinds of things and break off either the usb port or the dongle itself.

also, is there any model available with a PixelQi screen yet?