Apple CEO Tim Cook during his keynote said that around 130 million customers have purchased their first Apple device in the last twelve months states, "Many of these customers were switchers from Android,"

So, tell me, Tim, are you bad at math, or duplicitous? It is also true that many first time users of Android, nowadays, are switchers from iPhone. How can I know that without having any figures at hand? Simple: Said slightly differently: Many people who buy a smartphone today are on their second or later smartphone, and there are only two major smartphone OSs. If it is their first smartphone with OS A, it must be either their first smartphone, or they had a Windows phone (not many of those out there), or they switched from OS B. Simple math means many who use OS A for the first time switched from OS B.

So, Tim, are you saying neither you nor anyone who went over your speech could figure that math out, or are you saying you expect your audience won't catch it, and you'd try to put one over on them? Are you bad at math, or are you a used car salesman?

department officials were at pains to make it clear the LAPD doesn't intend to use the new hardware to keep watch from above over an unsuspecting public.

Ahh, well that completely sets my mind at ease. How could anyone doubt the integrity of the LAPD?

Rolliins is an excellent poet, I love his work. Worth noting, in this case that he does just as well at generalizing, in "I know you.".

I've known people like that. But I've known more who went through all that, and came out the other side as full of compassion and love as when they went in. Not that they never felt anger, or fear, or rejection, or even hate, but that it never consumed them, never defined them.

And I've known people who have led a charmed and charismatic life, loved by all around them, and have a core of darkness and loathing in them that is genuinely frightening.

So I think your Rollins post gets it right, that generalizing is flawed. But Rollins' "I know you" makes it clear that a compelling narrative can appear to present a general truth.

What's illegal about it? Is it illegal to use Microsoft's provided tools to edit my registry, browing to HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SYSTEM\WPA, then creating a new key called PosReady, then creating a new dword in PosReady called "Installed" with a value of 00000001?

See Aaron Swartz: Federal prosecutors later charged him with two counts of wire fraud and 11 violations of the Computer Fraud and Abuse Act,[12] carrying a cumulative maximum penalty of $1 million in fines, 35 years in prison, asset forfeiture, restitution and supervised release.[13]

Thanks -- said what I came here to say. Well, except you said it better.

It would be much more honest to tax them directly instead of letting the auto industry act as an intermediary.

The reason they don't do that is to leave as much of the implementation as possible in the hands of the free market, while still achieving the electric vehicle roll-out goals. It's pretty much the same thing as CAFE regulations, which mandate the fleet fuel efficiency, but let the car companies decide how to adjust models and prices to achieve the overall average.

It is an approach that is strongly advocated by free-market-oriented (ie: right wing) policy analysts. The sound-bites against it you hear from the right are not genuine objection to the practice as opposed to other means of achieving the same roll-out goals, they are API calls; programming you to go onto social network sites and bitch about guv'mint regyuh-lashun.

I question your premise that the existence of something that couples users to YouTube equates to a blanket condemnation of the service as evil and exploitative.

Well, my goodness. No wonder we got off on the wrong foot, then. I didn't intend to make a blanket condemnation of YouTube as evil and exploitative. Look at my .sig.

The above-mentioned daughter has a YouTube account to which she posts videos, so you could declare she was "coupled" to the service,

That's not too bad. It's a really weak example, but it is one. It is also arguably a necessary part of the service, so it's not a very good example for illuminating the case. But you are right; creating a user account is a very small barrier to entry for competition. Technically it is an example of how YouTube as a stand-alone video distribution service is not in an ideal free market, but there are much better examples.

Let's try a different approach; do you believe that net neutrality regulation could bring us closer to the theoretical free market?

How is that different to iTunes?

It's not. Nor to Facebook. Or even, to a much lesser extent, Slashdot. Many, maybe most, major network services have integrated aspects that create a barrier to competition which is not directly related to the quality of their core service.

It's not even necessarily an entirely bad thing in and of itself. Like monopolies, the problem is not the market situation itself, but the potential for abuse that comes with it. It is that potential that YouTube is attempting to exploit by coupling YouTube privileges to accepting a music service contract.

I'm not seeing the closed market you are describing, at least with respect to YouTube.

I don't believe you have tried. You sound pretty intelligent. If you really want to discuss this, give me something. Show me that you can at least make one attempt to see something that couples users to YouTube. If you try, you will be able to identify at least one thing that brings back repeat users that is not related to the quality of YouTube as a stand-alone video distribution service.

I'm not going to bicker with someone who doesn't want to see.

Strong arming? Threat? De-listing? Bullshit. Use the music service someone else created for you, find another that suits you better, or create your own. That should be how things work in a free market.

Yes, it should be, but surely you have noticed that YouTube doesn't compete like a stand-alone video distribution service in a free market. YouTube has a bunch of features that couple users to it. That coupling gives YouTube a partially closed market.

You are right that in a free market there would be no problem here. But we don't have one. As you seem to be a fan of the free market, perhaps the next question on your mind should be what we can do to address the flaw in the market to create a closer practical approximation of the theoretical ideal.

That is, of course, assuming you truly care about the free market, and are not just wielding the term to distract readers from a dogmatic and irrational belief in laissez faire.

A kook is someone that just posts their idiotic opinions on websites. This guy is a kook.

No, kook is still a value judgment, much like calling his opinions idiotic. They may be so -- I even think they are -- but focusing on that aspect of this story is sensationalism, not thinking. It is better left to the drooling mouth breathers who think Jerry Springer is hard hitting journalism. Like calling Hitler a madman, it may be true, but it is shallow and has no place in substantive discussion.

A radical is someone who acts on their beliefs.

Wrong. A radical who acts on their beliefs (in the sense I think you are implying) is a specific subtype of radical, "violent extremist."

>> The government has created a martyr.

> No, they have created a kook.

No, they have created a radical.

Using the term "martyr" or "kook" is a judgment of merit. I agree with the latter, he's batshit looney, but it's not objective. Casting aspersions is all well and good in the popular media, but aren't we here to try to scratch a little deeper? Fine, he's a shitbag who's trying to get his ten minutes of fame and maybe ought to be back behind bars. But is he really the interesting part of the story in any sense other than lurid sensationalism?

What we sane and self-aware citizens should be asking ourselves is not whether a lowlife deserves to be treated like scum -- of course he does, like terrorists deserve to be assassinated and child abusers deserve to be beaten. The question for us is whether we should do what we did -- not because he deserves better, but because we may have done something that is beneath us.

Why Bitcoin and not Dogecoin (or any other e-currency) ?

My guess would be he wanted to use the one with the most penetration, because his real objective (or at least a simultaneous objective) is to do a little crowdbusking.

As a side note; he may be little more than an irritating troll, but it will be interesting to see where this goes. Think of him as a walking, flaming, honeypot.

Thanks for the update, diligent and forthright to do so.

mice ... may simply exercise because they like to.

Hence the term, "Gym Rats".

Thank you, thank you. Remember to tip the waitstaff, I'll be here all week.