The iPhone is definitely not cutting edge technology, despite what some people believe. The iPhone is more the tried and true stuff, although I think most people use it for the software, not the hardware. However, for those who like power and fun in their pockets, the S4 is the bomb.

It is delusional to take the title of a slashdot article serious without even having a quick glimpse over the links provided. The only new item on the official paper is, that they wish for a gender gap to be closed. Furthermore the president of that organisation gave a speech where he told about his wish for everyone to have access to a 20MBit connection at 20$ / month It is yet another misleading Slashdot headline you fell for; An all-year April's prank, so to speak.

If you can make $15/hr remotely, I'd suggest Montenegro. Find a place near the sea, you got it made. You might have to work at getting a really great broadband deal, but there are some to be had. If you're single, the women there are beautiful and have sexy accents, you've got the sea and off-season the tourists go away and you can really enjoy the good life. You're a short hop from shopping in Italy, skiing in the Alps and you're still not in the EU (yet). Learn to play tuba in a Balkan horn band. Drink lots of coffee and slivovitza. Go out in your backyard and pick fresh figs for breakfast. Even if swimming in crystal-blue seas is not your idea of fun, you can set yourself down in a sidewalk cafe and watch one Mila Jovovic after another walk by. And there's none of the snobbiness of Western Europe.

Anyone who pre-ordered through origin (like me) received $20 off coupon for a purchase of $30 or more through origin. Not a bad deal, I could pick up C&C franchise for $29.99 and add a $5 or $10 filler to break that threshold.. sure I'd be giving them a bit more money but every C&C game ever made for $20 seemed like a good deal. However the fine print says the offer expired today at 10am PDT. I don't recall seeing the limitation to the offer until after I had purchased the game. Today I got the email telling me I'll get a free game due to the Sim City fuckup. It's not fine print this time but the email says that eventually we'll be able to choose our game (doesn't say when exactly) but we have to have it downloaded by March 30th. They want to limit their "losses" by making the instructions difficult to understand and leaving a very short window to "cash in". EA are a bunch of dicks (I knew it already, just felt like reiterating).

$200K+ for sharing 24 songs? Those profound douche-baggery. I'm so glad that newer methods are emerging to kill off the record label. This is an example of the industry that we call "The legal system", milking the life-force out of lady justice and then ripping her corpse apart and devouring it without a napkin. There's no measure of justice involved at all. Was there REALLY $222K in damage? Hell no, she helped advertise a brand, of sorts. What a disgusting farce. Glad I don't live in the states.

Now that I think about it, in some places, creating a traffic jam is not that hard. Here in Boston, traffic jams happen whenever it snows, whenever it rains, when the sky is clear and the sun is low in the sky (the traffic report calls it "solar glare"), when there's an accident (even in the opposite direction on an interstate highway: "curiosity delays"), whenever there's a Red Sox game or other event at Fenway Park, and when there's road construction. So based on the frequency of traffic jams and the diversity of causes, it does not seem to take much to cause a traffic jam around here. Rural Nebraska might be another story. Now, to use faked traffic data to *prevent* a traffic jam, that would be a truly noteworthy hack!

You OWN your home, even though its mortgaged. You are not leasing it. You are not renting it. It is yours to do with ANYTHING you please. The bank has a lien on your home if your are mortgaged. They do not own it, nor can they tell you in any way what to do with it. You can sell it for any price you wish or burn it down, but before the government will grant the deed to someone else, they must verify the lien has been removed. Likewise, when I purchase a phone + contract, I own the phone immediately. The phone company counts it as an immediate sell on their books and all other accounting, which is why you pay taxes for it immediately rather than over time. The sell of the phone is complete at that time in every legal way that matters. Its not a lease, its a sale. If it was a lease, you would be required to buy it at the end of your contract ... that is a LEGAL requirement for leases, they can't automatically be 'given' at the end. The purchase price can be one dollar (which you'll find on all sorts of deals, Lease at XXX amount, buyout for $1, great corp accounting cheat ;), but a new transaction must take place for the lease to become a sell. They aren't doing that, again making it clear the sale happens at the start of the contract. If I were renting or leasing, the price of my monthly bill would go down when I stopped leasing or renting, like if I bought a unlocked, no contract phone. But it doesn't. My bill remains the same regardless of where my phone comes from. Again, it can't be a lease or rental if there is no transaction and length of terms. They have structured it as a sell in every way for their accounting purposes, but they want to pretend its not, again for their own financial interests (keeping you tied in to their service). As far as 'defaulting', they are not the legal framework designed to deal with that situation. They are not supposed to be enforcers either. They have early termination charges attached as an agreed on termination cost. Not allowing your phone to not work on another provider ISN'T IN THE CONTRACT AT ALL, so its not something you agreed on ever. If I pay $600 cash in $100 bills to Joe Smith who happens to own an unlocked iPhone on the street corner, the phone company treats me the same in EVERY SINGLE WAY as the guy who gets a contracted iPhone. So you get treated like you bought it ... again, they treat it as a sell for their benefit. Only when it may benefit you is it suddenly not a sale to you but some other rental term bullshit they made up.

I don't understand this whole obsession people have that companies who offer free products have some sort of moral right to abuse us. The fact is that Google makes money hand over fist, and just like all other companies isn't afraid to cancel a product that people depend on, if they think its in their one best interest. Well screw them, it doesn't mean we have to like it or accept it. If being an asshole is a right, then I can be an asshole straight back at them and expect them to stand behind the products they try so hard to get me to use.

The USA landed on the moon 44 years ago, we can do it again today. Being prepared is a good thing. It won't be many decades before there is an American colony on the moon.

The US drop is because of the drop in Nat Gas prices, not wind turbines or Solar, etc. Both Germany and Denmark have installed many times the $ investment per capita in 'green' energy that the US has done, to no effect. In fact Germany is increasing coal consumption and moving to coal based electricity. In short the green energy revolution has failed, where a simple price change on gas has worked. Pollution is caused by the burners, not the diggers. You can bet that US coal is extracted in a safer, cleaner way than almost all other coal on the planet. If coal is to be burned, then US coal is the best way to do it.