I don't think the question is whether it's worth the trouble. It think the question is can these companies make good games with these lame sets of rules, and will those games appeal to Chinese gamers. If that does not happen it will not matter how big their market is. Another issue to consider is how will the rules change in the future. The Chinese government is very aggressive at combating excessive gaming. Don't put it past them to decide that video games in general do not fit their socialist values. They have already done just that with other types of digital media.

If you say your buying habits are probably not the norm and that you might be cheap, and the product is only "a little" high to be deemed and impulse buy type item, then the item is probably an impulse buy type item based on your own suggestions. In addition, you generally wouldn't convert the price of something in £s to US dollars to see how much it would cost in the US. It doesn't work that way. The cost is actually differs a lot by region. You would be looking at closer to $50 ot $60, the price of a game.

I'm currently using Chrome but AdBlock is a big deal. Until I switched to Chrome I had no idea that some of the websites I used had so many full page ads that required you to wait a few seconds then click close before you view the content. It's not a matter of there being a few ads, its a matter of going to a news website where there is literally a dozen animated ads. There is a big difference here in the user experience. I have even noticed that the performance boost you get from Chrome is often negated by the lack of AdBlock.

The ironic thing about this story is their website provides a seamless experience for the user by mimicking the behavior of PC crapware on their website. I appreciate the sentiment of the article and many of the other like minded articles on the internet. Now if only those content providers would look to their own products (their website) and rid them of at least some of the crap that they bundle with their products. All the obtrusive advertising, animations, and especially the full page or layered adds are just as bad in almost every way that the crapware installed by PC OEMs is. And likewise, there are tools for removing or blocking this garbage, a process which degrades the user experience. In addition, the excuse is the same, the product wouldn't be possible or free without ads. Fine but have some restraint. The homepage alone has at least 6 animated adds and the entire background is a Dell add.

I live in Washington State and I don't care. But aside from anecdotal evidence, it would be completely out of character for most Washington state residents to care. Most of them would figure that MS is bringing that potential tax revenue back to the state in other ways. In contrast to Boeing, their rep locally is pretty good. In addition it wouldn't be surprising if the state changed the law to allow the company to continue, and most people here wouldn't say a damn thing about it. It happens here all the time, and many people support it because the state is often seen as not having a very attractive business climate.

The OEMs that support Android will continue to support the other OS's so this might compound that problem for average consumers.

Yes and part of the problem are the devices that Android runs on. Another problem is the branding. If Android is just an OS it will not have the branding and luxury power of the IPhone. This may not matter to me but it will affect sales. This is great, but it is also a weakness when competing with a complete package like BB or IPhone.

This is a benefit has not and probably will not be received by the consumer.

Same thing with WinMo. But that doesn't really matter if you find Apple, Blackberry, or Nokia hardware more attractive.

I don't see any indication that this is true. I wish it were true, that's the only reason it sounds good.

Manufactures can and do enable disable features on WinMo easily. The problem is the driving forces behind this comes down to money. What the consumer wants is not always more profitable. Now giving this power to the consumer, in a user friendly manner would be a real benefit.

True, but the OEMs are running Android on hardware that isn't as refined and their OS customizations (ex HTC Home screens Today screens) drastically degrade performance. I think what people are failing to see is that Android has the same problems that WinMo and Symbian based OSs have. One is branding, the other is the hardware. The fact is there will always be a large portion of people who prefer an Apple or RIM device over and HTC or Samsung one, and it won't matter what features are involved. Many consumers, not the ones here, but ones that aren't as tech savvy are going to identify more with the hardware than the OS. In that case they often won't care or know which of the 3 OS's come on their new Samsung smartphone. Another thing you are forgetting is that the OEMs that make Android devices are the same ones iPhone and BB users are not satisfied with. Android will come with whatever weaknesses Samsung, HTC, Motorola, LG etc introduce via hardware and even their own OEM OS customizations. I'm an Android user myself. The platform is great, but I think people are missing the marketing power of a complete package that has luxury appeal, and these are benefits that Android does not have.

The problem is most people don't know where or when to use slate tablets despite the fact that there are plenty of situations where they do excel and because of that they often compromise by using a Smartphone in those situations or just waiting until they get stationary. If you are comparing them to a notebook then that is probably the first mistake. If you are at a table or a desk you probably don't need a slate tablet. However if you are standing, walking or in a situation where you need to hold your pc with one hand, then using a notebook is not only awkward, strange, and uncomfortable, but it's dangerous. Basically tablets allow you to use a full pc in situations where you can't easily use a notebook. It's not a rare situation because smartphones attempt to do the same thing, and as much as people love their capabilities, smartphones just don't work for many types of applications. Consequently many smartphones have been moving in the direction of a slate tablet. It's almost as if they are working backwards towards a technology we already had.

Here's what I saw from the recent interview on cnet (for a vm you will be paying $169): http://news.cnet.com/8301-13579_3-10310131-37.html

Then why was there such a long line when they opened Forever21 in Tokyo?

Also look at computers. Sony Vaio has a much better rep there, and that is not about quality.

Have you ever been to a bathroom in Tokyo? Not at a nice restaurant or Hotel, but an average place. Even my apartment that had a washlet (separate room) had the crappiest little bathroom. It resembled and RV bathroom - a big molded piece of plastic, the sink and shower share the same hose etc. Almost every apt I went to seemed to have the same type of bathroom. The washers and dryers there were also horrible. Most of the average priced dryers would steem dry your close and it would take about 4hrs.

I could go on but when I lived there consumers really weren't any more informed or concerned about quality than anyone else. They just had a different set of products that you could call cheap. But when it comes to brand motivation, Tokyo is probably the biggest display of brand worship you will ever see.

I wouldn't call it a troll just somewhat uniformed as SMS MMS isn't what they usually use in Japan, its an email based protocol. Some phones such as many Softbank phones come with SMS MMS but that's mostly for international use and the default messaging protocol is a form of push email. Tons of phones released in Japan do not have SMS MMS. Their largest carrier Docomo didn't have any for a long time until and when they did it was for their line international phone. SMS MMS is not an issue there.

You haven't crunched any numbers. You haven't actually calculated any of this in regards to the tax rate you posted. You just displayed some random cost of living expenses and assumed the big numbers offset the large difference in national income tax. Consider that tax scales with income and those cost of living expenses do not and you don't have much of an argument, at least not with the evidence you provided. The 400k number for education is nonsense by the way. It may exist in some extreme cases by it is not useful for these purposes.

Nobody likes to pay more taxes, but comparing tax rates directly without taking into account everything else is pure fiction.

No it isn't fiction. Taxes are mandatory. Some of the stuff you named is important but is not mandatory. What you are really talking about is what is done with the tax money. Of course if you pay higher taxes, you will get more services. But with lower taxes you have the option of not paying for certain services if you don't want them. I'm not saying it's a better method, but there is value in that as well. You also have a better source for making investments.

Also some of your numbers are way off. For example, your university figure appears to be for private out of state universities. In contrast there are many good public in state universities and the tuition is significantly cheaper because of taxes (often nowhere near 50k). In addition, there are good private in state universities that don't fit that rate either.

Actually most Japanese would also view this as a drastic response but with a little more contempt for the person who killed themselves than Americans are used to because it disrupts their lives. It's considered a desperate and inconsiderate act, especially for someone who isn't even a well known public figure, (the rare case where honor might even be considered and even then it's mostly only going to be a few right wing lunatics that cheer for you). The motivation is now more of a frowned upon social problem as opposed to some valiant effort to maintain honor that everyone accepts. If you want to consider modern Japanese culture then the extreme pressures of society and the workplace are the motivation.

Who cares how they perform. All they have to do is sit there and scare away enemy fleets.

Impossible. Robots don't kill people. People kill people.... I've been waiting to say that for a long time so just forget I was here.

I'm sure the Swiss don't all think alike.