I dunno, so why do you think the uptake on Google Wallet has been so poor? I think the other fella down there has a good point -- they never properly marketed the thing.

NB. Swillden is either an employee of has an "It's Complicated" relationship status with Google Inc.

So as long as there is capitalism and a functioning free market, there will always be poor people.

Which no doubt explains the abysmal standard of living in the Soviet Union back in the day - too capitalistic....

5) Police get warrant for health spa's credit records.
6) Police now have a list of hundreds of suspects. And the spa doesn't even know it's happened.

These people don't use credit cards, boss, it's like sticking a big flag on your head saying "arrest me."

Does TFA say how they got the emails? I just read yesterday that someone had discovered that you could enter arbitrary email addresses into CurrenC registration wizard, and if you were snooping the wire, the MCX server would return a completely filled-out user record for each entered email address.

I wonder why Apple is seen as a threat more? Their network of friends? Number of potential users can't be it - many more Android phones than iPhone 6s.

My understanding is that even on NFC-equipped Android phones, Google never had a proper deployment strategy; they only partnered with a few card issuers, they didn't really work with any merchants to get them on board, Verizon blocked their app on their phones, it was only limited to the US, etc.

Over that first weekend, we know now that ApplePay adoption was in the millions, and in those first few days CVS probably saw this deluge of NFC transactions and were like, the jig is up, the train is leaving the station, and if we continue to allow NFC transactions through the 2014 Christmas season the Payments War will be over and CurrenC won't have even been a contender.

A credit card isn't cash, credit cards emit a very long paper trail. Imagine how easy the police's job would be if criminals actually used credit cards in the manner you describe.

Any person shall have the same right to access the Internet on equal terms, using appropriate and up-to-date technologies that remove all economic and social barriers. The fundamental right to Internet access must be ensured with respect to its substantive pre-conditions, not only as the mere possibility of connecting to the Internet.
Access shall include freedom of choice with regard to operating systems, software, and applications.
The effective protection of the right to Internet access requires appropriate public intervention to overcome all forms of digital divide - based on cultural, infrastructural or economic factors particularly as regards accessibility by persons with disabilities.

Hey, free computers for everyone! I like that.

And there's the freedom of choice of OS - can I get the Cray Operating System? If not, where's my "free choice"? What, they'd have to give me a Cray-1 to use that OS? Not a problem, I've always wanted a Cray-1....

You know that's kind of old school. There is this new technology called "digital communications" which means that they can read the instruments from miles away, removing the need for the bunker since the mid 1960's or so. There were no bunkers for the Saturn V (I believe the first Saturn I flights still had them) or the Shuttle - everything was monitored from ~ 3 miles away. At the Cape the Range Safety Officer looks at computer screens at the Range Operations Control Center at Cape Canaveral Air Force Station (probably 10 or 15 miles from the NASA launch sites on Merritt Island), and I am pretty sure similar practices are followed at Wallops.

Thanks for clearing that up.

I heard on twitter that this was not the crowdfunding satellite, but an early test, so your investment may be OK.

The loss includes the first satellite for Planetary Resources, the Arkyd, an orbiting telescope intended to hunt for asteroids.

Seeps and uncontrolled weeks-long pressure-driven explosion of oil are not the same thing.

Yeah, seeps are basically forever, but weeks-long pressure driven explosions are over in...weeks.

More over, some people are genuinely competent at things.

But not at everything.

Everyone has some amount of incompetence in some field. And the smarter (or more competent) they are, the more likely they are to believe that their field of competence extends to other things....

I know what happens when you channel the phasers directly into the main engines! It's not pretty!

I remember it being quite pretty, and at the time wormhole effect was one of the first film visual effects created by scanning laser.

Also, beeeellllllaaaaaayyyy thhaaatt phaaaassseer ooooordderrr.

They add 3% to all prices, give you a 0.5% kickback and you're so happy for the money you "saved" that you act as their pro bono salesman too.

There's really no "playing" involved. If you are consumer, credit cards are simply better than store loyalty programs, on the merits.

BankAxept is better than credit cards, but Americans don't have BankAxept. Scandinavians have BankAxept, because the company that clears effectively every financial transaction in northern Europe, Nets Group, is a tolerated monopoly with a protected market, and banking regulations in Denmark clearly delineate transactions fees to be paid by the consumer.