What the fuck are these things? Am I supposed to know software/brand/product/service names off the top of my head?

Ever thought about using your favourite search engine to look them up?

There are plenty of non-USA based readers here who have to do that whenever a USA-centric article appears (which is often).

"this will be only used if the guests do not show up"...well, I created a virtual VISA with 5 EUROS. First thing my parents heard from the idiots "Your VISA card is not working".

Hotels typically do a pre-authorisation on your card which essentially checks to see if the card is active and that you have enough balance to cover the amount they are pre-authing. It does this by placing a hold on that amount until the transaction is settled or the authorisation falls off (usually a couple of days, but could be longer)

Since you only loaded on 5 euros, it'll naturally fail if they attempt a pre-auth above that. People who hand over a card to a hotel with not enough money on it are commonly trying to rip the hotel off.

TLDR; version: The hotel weren't "idiots", you just didn't understand how card payments work. Next time, create a virtual card with enough funds to actually cover the bill.

Back in 2011 we had a vote in the UK as to whether we would switch our voting system from "first past the post" to "alternative vote".

Although my Facebook feed was absolutely riddled with people proclaiming their support for AV and no-one for FPTP (and a quick straw poll of my work colleagues suggested the same for them) that wasn't reflected in the results which were that 68 per cent voted No (to AV) and 32 per cent voted Yes.

Facebook may have influenced some people to go out and vote, but it certainly didn't seem to reflect how the country voted as a whole.

Waiting half an hour to buy a ticket for about ten bucks, then suffering for 3 hours in 100+ degrees heat to ensure you need to buy something to drink, sitting and standing in the leftovers of the previous show and getting to choose to either not understanding any dialogue or getting a tinnitus from explosions and music (or rather, having that choice being made for you)...

I went to see Gone Girl in a UK cinema a couple of weeks ago. Ticket and food purchases were quick (although shockingly expensive), there was no queuing, toilets were clean, cinema was warm and clean, patrons talked quietly until after the adverts ended, no-one's phone rang, no-one took out their phone and started browsing facebook, no-one talked over the film and the volume was set at a comfortable level.

The only time I've had a bad experience was twice and I go to the cinema about twice a month. One about 3 years ago where the air conditioning was going nuts and it was way too cold and one about 9 years ago where some kids talked throughout the film.

Why is the cinema experience in America so utterly miserable?

Actually, we are sending several fighter jets to bomb ISIS, right now. Odds are that's what is precipitating these attacks.

I didn't say any of that. I said, we know how to mete our own form of justice to those that deserve it.

We will not go apeshit. We will not allow our government unrestricted control over every aspect of our lives or violate our laws.

What we will do is find those responsible, and hold them accountable, and very little will stop us until we think this has been accomplished. That is the way we have always done things. (And perhaps burn down the Whitehouse just for shits and giggles on the way home. ;) )

Word is in, the Reservist who was standing watch at the War Memorial has passed away.

Sorry Lumpy, but this is the second soldier killed on Canadian soil this week by, presumably, an extremist. We only put up with so much, then we go all http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ardenne_Abbey_massacreArdenne Abbey on them. As the German SS if that massacre was worth what our soldiers did to them afterward. "No Prisoners" was the chant.

Does the Touch ID imply that it also has an NFC chip for ApplePay? (Apparently it does, and the iPad Mini 2 doesn't.) That's an odd thing to leave off the comparison chart.

This was mentioned in the keynote. Although they both have Touch ID, neither of them come with NFC.

As a result, they'll only support half of Apple Pay. That is, they'll support purchasing things online from retailers, but not contactless transactions at physical merchants with a contactless terminal.

If there was anything else worthwhile, wouldn't apple be boasting about it rather than us having to wait for a teardown?
I am convinced that Touch ID isn't worth $100 to me...

I don't remember Apple talking very much about internal memory on an iPad - mainly because it means nothing to the average customer.

As a result I'm hoping that the Mini 3 has 2GB compared to the 1GB inside the Mini 2. That way Safari can manage to open 2 tabs without having to force a reload (so losing your buttons and form fields) when you return to a tab.

If you look at this comparison chart you can see that the iPad Mini 3 is exactly the same as the existing iPad Mini with Retina Display (now called iPad Mini 2) with the exception of two things:

1. It's got Touch ID
2. It's $100 more expensive

I'm not entirely convinced that Touch ID is worth the extra $100. Hopefully the IHS teardown will indicate if there is anything else of value between the two.

For the first time since I started w/the iPhone (the 3G was my first one), I see absolutely nothing of value with this major release version which makes me want to upgrade to it.

I'll be paying $99 for the 5S and be happy w/it. Sorry but unnecessarily bigger sizes and a better camera is not worth $200+contract renewal.