Comment Helpless (Score 1) 716
Cry me a river about "the highway" when the developers already dismiss the best alternative application marketplace (Android). To the developers: Android dollars or no dollars. Or bending over for the will of Apple.
Comment Points! (Score 4, Interesting) 365
The price differential on Business versus Economy is insane in dollar terms, but "reasonable" in points. The usual price in frequent flyer points for Business is 2x Economy, which is a great comparative value to the 3.5x dollar price difference.
A business class ticket USA-Asia would be $6000 versus $1000, but 115,000 versus 60,000 FF points.
Comment Re:I type Shenanigans on the OP (Score 1) 425
I'm nowhere near the top 5% of typists, but it was not all that hard to get 85WPM. Perhaps the sample studied is not representative of the population?
Comment Re:isn't this obvious? (Score 1) 220
I'm reminded of a Miss Manners quote.
"If you're willing to marry a man that will cheat on his wife, you are marrying a man that will cheat on his wife."
Comment Please do (Score 1) 241
This seems like a fast way to force Net Neutrality laws, as the resulting carnage of takeovers and mergers create segregated islands of content. Even congressmen and senators should find it difficult to swallow needing all of a Comcast, AT&T, and Verizon connections to obtain their Disney, FOX, and HGTV channels.
Although I also think the telecoms are underestimating the power of the "independent" content providers, like Google or Yahoo. Clout-wise, companies like that might actually be able to extract payment from the backbones for the privilege of getting customers to them. What's Comcast going to do, say "sorry you can't do that" to their customers because they don't have an agreement with Google?
Comment Re:German results (Score 1) 674
A better name than the Official Monster Raving Loony Party of the UK.
Comment Re:Only poor people? (Score 1) 841
The richer people don't become infected, but that's not a right deigned upon the rich. Rather, it's a consequence of that the rich have the resources to avoid and treat it.
There is nothing that says only the poor should be infected, nor that the rich have the right to not be infected. That only the poor do become infected is what Mr. Gates was commenting on. And on that, he's dead accurate.
Comment Re:Why do companies do this? (Score 1) 345
This is effectively a dividend increase. They think the rate of return on other companies is not good enough at the moment, and the cash is just sitting there. So they'll return it back to shareholders.
Consequences: lower float -> higher earnings per share.
Microsoft Re-Brands PlaysForSure 194
mikesd81 writes "Information Week writes about a licensing change intended to 'beat Apple at their own game'. They're going to use a combination of branding and DRM, and replace the "PlaysForSure" logo with a "Certified for Windows Vista" tag.'The certification is used to guarantee compatibility with Microsoft's copyright-protection software and is the same logo used for the company's Zune player. The problem, however, is that music and video bought from the online Zune Marketplace won't play in their native format on other devices, including those that will carry the new logo.'"
Blizzard and Activision Announce $18.8bn Merger 298
Ebon Praetor writes "The BBC reports that Blizzard and Activision have announced an $18.8bn merger. Activision's CEO, Bobby Kotick, will become the head of the joint company, while Vivendi, Blizzard's current parent company, will become the largest single investor in the new group. Even with the size of the merger, the combined company will still be smaller than the industry giant EA. 'As part of the merger plan, Blizzard will invest $2bn in the new company, while Activision is putting up $1bn. The merged business will be called Activision Blizzard ... Vivendi will be the biggest shareholder in the group.'"
Study Warns of Internet Brownouts By 2010 318
Bergkamp10 writes "Consumer and corporate use of the Internet could overload the current capacity and lead to brown-outs in two years unless backbone providers invest billions of dollars in new infrastructure, according to a new study. A flood of new video and other Web content could overwhelm the Net by 2010 unless backbone providers invest up to US $137 billion in new capacity, more than double what service providers plan to invest, according to the study by Nemertes Research Group. In North America alone, backbone investments of $42 billion to $55 billion will be needed in the next three to five years to keep up with demand, Nemertes said. Quoting from the study: 'Our findings indicate that although core fiber and switching/routing resources will scale nicely to support virtually any conceivable user demand, Internet access infrastructure, specifically in North America, will likely cease to be adequate for supporting demand within the next three to five years.' Internet users will create 161 exabytes of new data this year."
Submission + - Germany to build new maglev railway. (bbc.co.uk)
EWAdams writes: "According to the BBC, the Bavarian state government has announced that it has signed an agreement with Deutsche Bahn, the German state railway system, and the Transrapid consortium, to provide a maglev railway between central Munich and its airport. The only other maglev in full operation at the moment is in Shanghai, again as a city-to-airport service. No completion date has been announced."
Submission + - IT pay falls short, finds annual salary survey 1
BobB writes: A storm seems to be brewing in the IT job market. Pay raises have continued to outpace inflation, and bonuses are downright impressive — 11.6% on average. Yet, as the 2007 Network World Salary Survey finds, dissatisfaction over the salary package is rampant. Package includes a salary calculator to compare what you're making to those in your region and across U.S.
http://www.networkworld.com/salary/2007/092407-annual-salary-survey.html?ts0hb=&story=ab5_salartsrvy
Submission + - Richard Stallman talks on Copyright V. The People 5
holden writes: "Richard M. Stallman recently gave a talk entitled Copyright vs Community in the Age of Computer Networks to the University of Waterloo Computer Science Club. The talk looks at the origin of copyright, and how it has evolved overtime from something that originally served the benefit of the people to a tool used against them. In keeping with his wishes to use open formats, the talk and qa are available in ogg theora only."
Submission + - Former spammer reveals secrets in new book
StonyandCher writes: A retired spammer is looking to make money from a tell-all book rather than fleecing people dependent on pharmaceuticals and people with gambling problems. In this Computerworld article, "Ed," a retired spammer, predicts the spam problem will only get worse, aided by consumers with dependencies and faster broadband speeds.
From the article: He sent spam to recovering gambling addicts enticing them to gambling Web sites. He used e-mail addresses of people known to have bought antianxiety medication or antidepressants and targeted them with pharmaceutical spam. Response rates to spam tend to be a fraction of 1 percent. But Ed said he once got a 30 percent response rate for a campaign. The product? A niche type of adult entertainment: photos of fully clothed women popping balloons.
"Yes, I know I'm going to hell," said Ed.
From the article: He sent spam to recovering gambling addicts enticing them to gambling Web sites. He used e-mail addresses of people known to have bought antianxiety medication or antidepressants and targeted them with pharmaceutical spam. Response rates to spam tend to be a fraction of 1 percent. But Ed said he once got a 30 percent response rate for a campaign. The product? A niche type of adult entertainment: photos of fully clothed women popping balloons.
"Yes, I know I'm going to hell," said Ed.
