Serious question: why is this considered a "good thing"? Other portable things that require durability aren't made of glass.

Why? So a handful of law firms can score big dollars while you and I get a check for $15 and 2 years of free credit monitoring? Class action suits rarely (never?) help the actual victims.

Seriously. An app that allows people to send you anonymous messages? I read their justification: to get candid feedback from coworkers and such. I suppose if that is something you welcome, then letting the app have access to your contacts so it would know who can send you messages, is expected.

But really, who would do this? If I know you, and you want to offer me candid feedback, do it.

I read on average 3 or 4 books a week; a mix of fiction and non. I have a Kindle Paperwhite, but my preference by far is print. The Kindle is too small, has too many page turns, and is uncomfortable to hold.

Cap guns. Baseball cards in bicycle spokes. The crack, as opposed to the ding, of the bat in baseball games.

The same can be said of an OS's APIs: "DOS isn't done 'till Lotus won't run".

google gives you a free email account, then uses it to market stuff to you. why would anyone be surprised, or upset? there are many free email options out there, use another one if you don't like how this one works.

re: your "designed in reverse" observation. Right on. And not only that, but many organizations still use those metrics of cpu cycles and I/O to bill internal clients for running reports. Which explains why people here in my current office are afraid to request reports.

In a meeting with your boos tell hom/her that one of your responsibilities as the IT guy is to ensure license compliance and that you would like to document all of your software. Ask for access to invoices to see what's been purchased. Inventory all software installed and prepare a report showing where there might be an issue. Offer a solution or solutions to dealing with the issue: buying licenses, researching alternative programs, etc.

Don't be confrontational, don't be a dick, don't make threats or demands. Do tell them about the BSA and what can happen if they are to get audited. Turn your concerns into a positive for the company. That's why they hired you.

with all due respect to a fellow slashdot poster, if you are asking a court to give you money for "loss of enjoyment of life" then your life is now fair game for examination. relying solely on the plaintiffs statements would not make for a just proceeding.

I'm not a kernel developer, but every mailing list to which I once subscribed moved to web based forums, which I find much, much more convenient to use. I think mailing lists are a relic which some are reluctant to give up, and I'm sure there may be good reasons for that. I just don't know what they are.

If a "solution" to spam were to exist or be developed, and mailing lists suffered collateral damage, there are other ways for the participants to communicate and discuss.

much of that problem is a holdover from pre-OS X days. many Mac users got so used to using little hacks from garage developers that they keep using them with OS X rather than finding a better way to do it. I've been a productive Mac users since 10.0 and haven't seen the need for "haxies" or other Rube Goldberg type programs.

My Levi 501's never change in style, and last a hell of a long time. I am ntt a slave to fashion. Black Friday makes me sad.

Perhaps, but solutions make money. I'm using some genuinely crappy software on an assignment now, but it's got the largest share of its market, and my employer is paying bags of money to use it. There is no open source equivalent, because it requires more expertise than just writing good code: legal, financial, and regulatory expertise isn't cheap.