Friday, February 22, 2008
Tuesday, February 19, 2008
Deal Or No Deal?
The big boys are battling it out in the unlimited usage plan market. First Verizon dropped heir price to $99 a month and now At&t is matching it. Never mind of course that these are voice only plans. No you'll have to shell out extra to check your email, surf the web, or send SMSes. But who can blame them? I mean come on, there isn't a wireless provider in the world that can offer all those things at a reasonable price. What? Helio dropped the price of their Unlimited All-in plan to $99 like last month? All the calls you can make? All the data you can use? GPS applications? Sprint and Verizon network coverage. Shit, I'd better go sign up with them.
Friday, February 15, 2008
You've Got My Number.
Wow. You know when you're watching TV late at night and the guy selling the whatever-no-one-needs describes someone in your exact situation? That's kinda how I feel right now. Stuff White People Like is a blog about, guess what... stuff white people like. And since I'm a fairly white guy (ever seen me dance?) I find it very interesting how pegged they have me. I mean check this out:
I don't like divorce, but I'm not old enough for that, I haven't seen Juno yet and I don't like Priuses because I believe the car industry can do better. But other than those...
Go ahead and read through a few. If you're a white person, or know some white people it should be pretty amusing. I haven't made it all the way through yet, but I'm willing to bet that "having their quirky preferences pointed out" is in there somewhere.
Also on the stereotyping but amusing front, there's the Nerd Handbook with "How to hack your Geek." I'm not sure I fully qualify cause I don't need to spend a day in the dark to acclimate from traveling and I kinda pride myself on versatility. But most of this is fairly enlightening as to the geek mind. Like the relevancy flags and defining systems with rules, man I love figuring out how things work. Anyway, if you finish reading about white people and still want more, its a pretty reliable write-up.
If you are in a situation where a white person produces an emptyYep. That's about it. What else? Expensive sandwiches? Well, I've been trying not to eat out for lunch as much... mostly cause every time I throw down like eight or nine bucks on a sandwich. Co-Ed Sports. Are sailing, Ultimate Frisbee and Curling Co-Ed? Yesh. Japan. I love Japan. Its so... safe. I also apologize at the drop of a hat. Etcetera, etcetera.
bottle, watch their actions. They will first say “where’s the
recycling?” If you say “we don’t recycle,” prepare for some awkwardness.
I don't like divorce, but I'm not old enough for that, I haven't seen Juno yet and I don't like Priuses because I believe the car industry can do better. But other than those...
Go ahead and read through a few. If you're a white person, or know some white people it should be pretty amusing. I haven't made it all the way through yet, but I'm willing to bet that "having their quirky preferences pointed out" is in there somewhere.
Also on the stereotyping but amusing front, there's the Nerd Handbook with "How to hack your Geek." I'm not sure I fully qualify cause I don't need to spend a day in the dark to acclimate from traveling and I kinda pride myself on versatility. But most of this is fairly enlightening as to the geek mind. Like the relevancy flags and defining systems with rules, man I love figuring out how things work. Anyway, if you finish reading about white people and still want more, its a pretty reliable write-up.
The War On Falling Stuff.
Tired of the war on terror? Yeah, I think everyone's middle east attention-span is about tapped out by now. But luckily the Bush administration has found a new fear-well to tap. Death from above! Well, I guess its not a new source, they just couldn't wait for that rogue meteor to come an kill us all. A satellite is out of control and plummeting towards the earth! But they've got a plan, so its okay. But it still might be dangerous. And so on and so on; its gonna be okay because we're in control of the situation but you should still be scared because you might die.
"An out-of-control, school-bus-size U.S. spy satellite ... begins its plunge to Earth"
That's bad.
"Been working on the missile modifications for the past three weeks."
That's good.
"The satellite is carrying a substantial amount of hydrazine, a hazardous rocket fuel."
That's bad?
"[The] missile will be fired as the satellite reenters the atmosphere and has a reasonably high opportunity for success.'"
That's good.
"An uncontrolled reentry on or about March 6"
That's bad.
"We cannot predict the entry impact area."
That's bad.
"More than half the pieces will burn up or land before making two
revolutions around Earth, and the rest will come down in weeks, maybe
a month, but it's a very finite period of time that we can manage."
That's good?
"It could leak gas and cause potentially fatal injury [across] an area
the size of about two football fields."
That's not so bad.
"In the history of the space age, there has not been a single human
being who has been harmed by man-made objects falling from space."
Oh, that's good.
"Similar to chlorine or to ammonia in that when you inhale it, it
affects your tissues in your lungs," adding: "It has the burning
sensation. If you stay very close to it and inhale a lot of it, it
could in fact be deadly."
That sounds terrible.
"Trying to reduce the danger to human beings [and Rogue satellites want to eat your babies.]"
Ah! Someone save me!
Just effing shoot it down and lets move on.
"An out-of-control, school-bus-size U.S. spy satellite ... begins its plunge to Earth"
That's bad.
"Been working on the missile modifications for the past three weeks."
That's good.
"The satellite is carrying a substantial amount of hydrazine, a hazardous rocket fuel."
That's bad?
"[The] missile will be fired as the satellite reenters the atmosphere and has a reasonably high opportunity for success.'"
That's good.
"An uncontrolled reentry on or about March 6"
That's bad.
"We cannot predict the entry impact area."
That's bad.
"More than half the pieces will burn up or land before making two
revolutions around Earth, and the rest will come down in weeks, maybe
a month, but it's a very finite period of time that we can manage."
That's good?
"It could leak gas and cause potentially fatal injury [across] an area
the size of about two football fields."
That's not so bad.
"In the history of the space age, there has not been a single human
being who has been harmed by man-made objects falling from space."
Oh, that's good.
"Similar to chlorine or to ammonia in that when you inhale it, it
affects your tissues in your lungs," adding: "It has the burning
sensation. If you stay very close to it and inhale a lot of it, it
could in fact be deadly."
That sounds terrible.
"Trying to reduce the danger to human beings [and Rogue satellites want to eat your babies.]"
Ah! Someone save me!
Just effing shoot it down and lets move on.
Thursday, February 14, 2008
Its An EV, Not A Wraith.
Electric Vehicles in London are getting a little smack laid down in the congestion charge department. They used to enjoy an exemption when clogging the streets, but now will be grouped with the lowest emissions category instead of their own zero group. I can see plenty of people getting pissed off about this, especially if they just bought an EV to skirt the charge.
But oddly enough, I'm fine with it. Its a congestion charge, not an emissions charge. Sure, its aimed at reducing emissions in the long run, but its direct target is taking cars off the most congested roads. The very presence of congestion worsens everyone's fuel economy, so even though you're not belching C02 you're still contributing to the mess and producing second hand CO2. So while using an EV is a step in the right direction, its not biking or taking the tube.
(P.S. Your tailpipe will spew CO2 as long as we burn stuff to make power, no matter how far away from your car it is.)
But oddly enough, I'm fine with it. Its a congestion charge, not an emissions charge. Sure, its aimed at reducing emissions in the long run, but its direct target is taking cars off the most congested roads. The very presence of congestion worsens everyone's fuel economy, so even though you're not belching C02 you're still contributing to the mess and producing second hand CO2. So while using an EV is a step in the right direction, its not biking or taking the tube.
(P.S. Your tailpipe will spew CO2 as long as we burn stuff to make power, no matter how far away from your car it is.)
Free Money.
In college I usually had at least one "free money" or "free goods and services" scam in the works at any given moment. I miss those days. And reading about these stories of found wealth make me want to take a vacation to Nicaragua or the post office. Keep reading, it'll make more sense.
First off is a town in Nicaragua that is rolling in dough despite the fact that unemployment is around 85%. What's their secret? Beach combing for bales of cocaine that traffickers jettison when chased by the Coast Guard. Apparently you can do pretty well for yourself by picking up packets on the beach and heading over to the local supermarket to cash in. Its like aluminum cans in Michigan except you can walk away with eighty grand.
This next one doesn't involve international travel or strolling on the beach. Not unless you consider dumpster diving a day at the beach. Sony BMG mails people CDs, which are normally paid for by subscribers. However, if a subscriber moves and can't be found BMG instructs the post office to simply throw the discs away rather than pay to ship them back. One postal worker noticed how many perfectly good CDs were going in the trash out back and decided to salvage what he could. He ended up making about $80,000 selling them to record stores before someone caught on.
Now he's in a heap of trouble, or so BMG thinks. They originally wanted to slap mail fraud charges on him, but someone must have told them that mail doesn't get put in dumpsters, trash does. And there's no such thing as trash fraud. So now they're throwing copyright violations and "lost opportunity" claims to see if any of that sticks. I'm not sure I buy the copyright part, but BMG probably did have some lost opportunity. Which TechDirt points out is like the deli suing the pizza joint for feeding people at lunch.
First off is a town in Nicaragua that is rolling in dough despite the fact that unemployment is around 85%. What's their secret? Beach combing for bales of cocaine that traffickers jettison when chased by the Coast Guard. Apparently you can do pretty well for yourself by picking up packets on the beach and heading over to the local supermarket to cash in. Its like aluminum cans in Michigan except you can walk away with eighty grand.
This next one doesn't involve international travel or strolling on the beach. Not unless you consider dumpster diving a day at the beach. Sony BMG mails people CDs, which are normally paid for by subscribers. However, if a subscriber moves and can't be found BMG instructs the post office to simply throw the discs away rather than pay to ship them back. One postal worker noticed how many perfectly good CDs were going in the trash out back and decided to salvage what he could. He ended up making about $80,000 selling them to record stores before someone caught on.
Now he's in a heap of trouble, or so BMG thinks. They originally wanted to slap mail fraud charges on him, but someone must have told them that mail doesn't get put in dumpsters, trash does. And there's no such thing as trash fraud. So now they're throwing copyright violations and "lost opportunity" claims to see if any of that sticks. I'm not sure I buy the copyright part, but BMG probably did have some lost opportunity. Which TechDirt points out is like the deli suing the pizza joint for feeding people at lunch.
Got Buddy?
This is kinda sweet for me. One of the features on Helio is the buddy beacon. Its a service that uses the GPS receiver in the phone to push your location onto your friends' maps. Kinda a neat idea, but the big downside is that your friends have to have Helios to use the service. And since I can't convince any of you chumps to throw down, my map only has a marker for where I am making it sad and not very useful.
On to the sweet part. Helio sold the Buddy Beacon trademark to a company called uLocate a while ago, and they've just released a 2.0 version of the software. There are various changes but most importantly users of other services can use Buddy beacon on their phones too! Right now the site lists: Alltel, Helio, metroPCS, Sprint, and iPhone. On some phones this just involves pointing to a web page instead of installing the new app like on my phone. Which is why I assume they list iPhone as supported, but not At&t. You just need a good enough web browser to run the mobile page.
On the downside the buddy location symbols seem to be MIA in favor of a buddy circle. So you'll know which block your bud is on, not what part of the bar. I assume this is because most devices (*cough* iPhone) can't locate themselves that accurately and rather than list specious information, they just generalize it all. I think I'd like the option to display my little Helio icon on the map like I used to, and other people would have big ass circles. But maybe they're trying to keep everyone from knowing what kinda cocked-up device other people rock.
Obfustication aside, this is an exciting update that makes this service actually useful. Oh, and there's a Facebook app you can add too that I haven't checked out. But I assume it'll let you find friends that also have the service.
On to the sweet part. Helio sold the Buddy Beacon trademark to a company called uLocate a while ago, and they've just released a 2.0 version of the software. There are various changes but most importantly users of other services can use Buddy beacon on their phones too! Right now the site lists: Alltel, Helio, metroPCS, Sprint, and iPhone. On some phones this just involves pointing to a web page instead of installing the new app like on my phone. Which is why I assume they list iPhone as supported, but not At&t. You just need a good enough web browser to run the mobile page.
On the downside the buddy location symbols seem to be MIA in favor of a buddy circle. So you'll know which block your bud is on, not what part of the bar. I assume this is because most devices (*cough* iPhone) can't locate themselves that accurately and rather than list specious information, they just generalize it all. I think I'd like the option to display my little Helio icon on the map like I used to, and other people would have big ass circles. But maybe they're trying to keep everyone from knowing what kinda cocked-up device other people rock.
Obfustication aside, this is an exciting update that makes this service actually useful. Oh, and there's a Facebook app you can add too that I haven't checked out. But I assume it'll let you find friends that also have the service.
Wednesday, February 13, 2008
Street View Club.
You're never gonna come and do this in DC are you? I'd hoped you were up for trying to cover important parts of major cities. I mean, how kickass are the street views in DC? You can't walk half a block without finding a memorial or statue or iconic building. But no, you seem to only be interested in cities where you can document a good segment of streets without getting abducted and waterboarded by the federal government. Its all part of the experience! Oh, hey, if we ever actually get that state voting rights deal we should replace "Taxation without representation" on our license plates with "I'll waterboard you motherf*&ker".
12 more cities added to the street view list, none of them useful to me.
* Albany and Schenectady, NY
* Boise, ID
* Juneau, AK
* Kansas City, MO (home of the railway station!)
* Manchester, NH
* Milwaukee, WI
* Research Triangle Park (Raleigh, Durham, Chapel Hill), NC
* San Antonio, TX
* Salt Lake City, UT
12 more cities added to the street view list, none of them useful to me.
* Albany and Schenectady, NY
* Boise, ID
* Juneau, AK
* Kansas City, MO (home of the railway station!)
* Manchester, NH
* Milwaukee, WI
* Research Triangle Park (Raleigh, Durham, Chapel Hill), NC
* San Antonio, TX
* Salt Lake City, UT
Stop Saying Upgrade.
Yup, I overheard people talking about more blackberry outages recently. People are so used to being piped into the tubes that when they're cut off for a few hours they go into shock. Maybe that's why the term crackberry has caught on so well. I'm not a RIM customer, but I have had a similar type experience with Helio. (you may note this is one of the few issues I've had with my Helio.) After a while on the phone I got through to a tech who told me that they were pushing an upgrade on the system and my service would be back up in a few hours. This is the same excuse RIM recently gave its addicts for the recent network failure.
Lookit, its not an upgrade if it makes stuff stop working during peak hours. I'd call that a pretty significant downgrade in fact, and if you can't figure out when I'm less likely to be using my phone you should try calling people at random times and gage how pissed-off they sound. (3-4 in the morning is prolly your sweet spot)
So we all assume you're not idiots and you're not really pushing upgrades in the middle of the day, you just don't want to admit you've had problems. That would make us question the reliability of your service. But would your customers rather hear that your service had an accidental outage, or that you took it down on purpose at an obviously inappropriate time? I've wager on the former, because at least then you'd strive not to let it happen again.
Finally, at the very least, if these are indeed intended outages, send me a text message or email, put a banner up on the website. Let me know its the whole network so I don't spend 25 minutes troubleshooting my device only to be told its an "upgrade".
Lookit, its not an upgrade if it makes stuff stop working during peak hours. I'd call that a pretty significant downgrade in fact, and if you can't figure out when I'm less likely to be using my phone you should try calling people at random times and gage how pissed-off they sound. (3-4 in the morning is prolly your sweet spot)
So we all assume you're not idiots and you're not really pushing upgrades in the middle of the day, you just don't want to admit you've had problems. That would make us question the reliability of your service. But would your customers rather hear that your service had an accidental outage, or that you took it down on purpose at an obviously inappropriate time? I've wager on the former, because at least then you'd strive not to let it happen again.
Finally, at the very least, if these are indeed intended outages, send me a text message or email, put a banner up on the website. Let me know its the whole network so I don't spend 25 minutes troubleshooting my device only to be told its an "upgrade".
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)