I have never seen a 'forced update' on an iPhone. They are ALWAYS optional.

I completely agree with you, D3 lost its luster for me when I realized that getting good gear was trivial done by using the AH. Instead of caring about what dropped, the only metric that seemed to matter was gold farmed per hour.

MyFitnessPal allows you to set your activity levels. When I started I chose 'Sedentary' and I left it there for the entire period of my weight loss, as I wanted to err on the side of caution.

After dieting for a while and logging what I ate, I started avoiding calorie dense foods like rice and breads. They put me too close to my daily limit, too fast.

I found myself eating a lot of fresh vegetables and I avoided eating beef (one of the more calorie dense meats). It's really pretty simple.

I have no statistics to back this up, but I'd guess that for the vast majority of people CICO (Calories In Calories Out) works just fine.

As I said in my original post, for the first 15 weeks I did this I lost 30 pounds. The ONLY thing I looked at was how many calories I consumed and I kept my intake at or near what MyFitnessPal suggested. Some days I was over, some days I was under. On average I stuck to the limit and the graph of how much weight I lost was an almost straight line.

My wife had an exactly similar experience. We both started at the same time and after the same period of time passed we had each lost the same amount of weight. Any of my friends that started using the app, and honestly followed the calorie limits saw similar weight loss.

Yes, not everything has a barcode, but the app I'm using has a search function that allows you to either add the ingredients or the food item if the barcode is unavailable (at a restaurant for example). You can can also save a given meal or food item for easy addition later. I frequently make Thai Curry from store-bought curry paste. The paste itself has a negligible amount of calories, and is less calorie dense than coconut milk. So I just scanned the barcode for the that, added in some ballpark figures for whatever vegetables I added, and logged how much meat and rice I used. Now whenever I eat that, I can just go to my pre-saved meal and adjust the amount of rice or curry sauce I use and I'm good to go.

Your measurements don't have to be exact. When I guess at something I try to err on the side of logging more than I actually ate. Doing otherwise is really just lying to yourself.

There's an almost magic weight loss formula I've followed that just works. I was going to write a book about it, but as it turns out it would be more of a pamphlet or brochure in length.

Just make sure the following is true: calories consumed
I've been monitoring my calorie intake using a free app (My Fitness Pal) and it's been working great. I can scan barcode for just about anything that has one (it sometimes doesn't find odd things I might purchase in, say, an Asian Grocery). You punch in what your goal weight is, and how much you want to lose per week and it calculates your calorie intake and keeps track of how much of various nutrients you're getting (Sodium, Potassium, etc).

I told the app I wanted to lose 2 pounds per week, and over 15 weeks lost exactly 30 pounds. It takes a bit of discipline, but it helps develop the habits you'll need to keep the weight off.

No, it's about the people in charge wanting to be appear to be doing something.

This country is doomed. I'm not sure anything can be done at this point other than put your head between your legs and wait for the wreckage to come to a complete stop.

Absolutely, but that's not really relevant to my comment or the one I replied to. He was saying that when computer parts manufacturers raise prices, he just buys his parts from someone else. And that works fine as longs as those parts are completely interchangeable (memory, hard drives, etc). But if you're selling ebooks, and you don't like Neal's publisher, then you simply can't sell his books unless you cave to their demands.

As Amazon said, the publishers have a monopoly on works by their authors.

That's all well and good when you're selling things for which equivalents can be easily found. For books if you want (say) the newest Neal Stephenson book, and you don't like the publisher's prices you can't just say "Well screw them, I'm going to get Neal's new book from this other publishers".

So, kind of like a Neal Stephenson book? (disclaimer: Cryptonomicon is probably my favorite book ever)

Perhaps if you snapped your fingers in a Z formation.

"two were high school classmates."

That's going to make for an awkward High School reunion.

I live in a state (Washington) that requires Amazon to charge me sales tax, and I still shop there. The main reason is free 2-day shipping (Prime only). I couldn't care less about sales tax when I can order something and have on my porch the next day for $3.99 or the day after for free.