IE will still do this, even the latest versions. Just go to IE options, Tab options, and turn on "Tab Groups". Although IE rendering and performance is so terrible I wouldn't really use it to achieve this, it is still there.

They said the same thing about right click. Microsoft one-upa the undiscoverability though: you get more options if you know to hold shift while you right-click an icon.

Apparently not long -- news (actual news, not some facebook feed junk blog crap) said that the US has barred several doctors and officials from speaking about the virus now.

It will still give you precisely what you actually ask for, you just have to press enter. The only thing they're doing is setting it not to "SUGGEST" those terms before you even type them.

For phones, it's the same technical mechanism. The only difference is the intent of the operator doing it.

Great idea, as soon as the phone companies allow this I'll be first to implement it. If cable TV can force me to buy their stupid package to live-stream a cable news channel from the web (and enforce it), then a phone company should be able to verify I'm paying for the specific number I'm sending as my caller ID name.

I'd be happy to, but the phone company needs to provide that (an API or something). There's nothing I could possibly do to fix it or create some new method. If the phone network supported it, I'd happily use any method they care to have.

Not even a little bit.

I work in an inbound-only call center (tech support for web host). If we call a client back, we spoof our number so the number they see on their caller ID is the same toll free number they called to reach us in the first place. We used to not do this, and every outbound call looked like it came from somewhere in Colorado (we're in Oklahoma), so it helped our customers in more than one way. First, they recognize it's us calling them back about their ticket, and two, they can call the number they saw on caller ID and reach us again. Previously the Colorado local number they saw went nowhere, it was just some bulk trunk line owned by Verizon and leased by our call ACD routing cloud software company. I'd argue it was worse for our clients when we couldn't spoof. They had no idea who was calling them, they get dead-air if they tried to call it back. Having said that, I'm sick of death of getting these "looks local" telemarketing recorded sales pitches, so much that I essentially treat phone calls like email now: safe senders only. If you aren't in my address book head of time, my phone doesn't even ring anymore. It's insane. I must get 3 a day.

At one point Microsoft had more than 100,000 middle managers and tens of thousands of "VP" positions. It's what happens when you have a shitload of money apparently.

I've wondered if the minimum should be tied to inflation so you keep the same buying power. That is, regardless of inflation, your salary will always get you the same number of loafs of bread or such. But clearly that isn't a single shot solution, since as you said the cost of living in (say) San Francisco is wildly different than Nowhere, OK.

Yes Amazon has 350k US workers, but how many were below this threshold (how many are being impact by the change?)

On Windows, if you have UAC enabled, you'll be asked if you want to let the installer elevate. But if you say "no" on that prompt, it will install without creating system services (since the installer never received the privilege escalation to do so). This is also how non-admins can install it on a per-user basis.

Agree. Most of it is the cool factor. I honestly can't off the top of my head think of anything Siri does that I can't with default voice search beyond querying/adding calendar events. Asking questions gives me results with Google, and if really wanted to have those read back to me I could use Vlingo. I can't ask "where can I get a sandwich", but I can tell Google Voice Search "nearby restaurants" and it gives me a map with pushpins marking them. That's honestly better than Siri to me.

My old Windows Mobile 5.x phone going on 8 or 9 years ago was able to use voice to "Play X artist" or "What's my next appointment" (still can't do that on Android),... and WinMo didn't even require a server connection to translate my voice into text. It could even respond to you. Say "Play music", it would ask "what do you want to play? By album, artist, genre, or shuffle?" You could even continue the conversation, just like Siri, by saying "what artists are available?" or something similar.

The only time a connection of any kind was required was if my request spawned a web search or geolocation process, which would be a normal webpage or map loading. I don't see why Apple needs "a huge data center" to handle these requests.