While I agree that it is in the consumer's best interest to have Apple open the store to all comers I don't agree that the FTC has legal grounds to slap them with fines (I know you didn't SAY that they had it - just sort of implied that maybe they could). Anyway, the lack of open access to the store is why I don't have an iPhone and instead waited and waited and waited and finally got a Droid (which I am thrilled with). It's also why anyone who cares about this type of issue shouldn't get an iPhone. We all talk about voting with our wallets. Some even practice it. But I sure see a lot of iPhones in the hands of folks who really (if they practiced what they preached) should have known better.
How do you feel about people who new better, bought the phone and jail-broke it?
My understanding was that the hardware vendors knew that because Microsoft had started to advertise Vista and that it would require better hardware, that no-one would buy any hardware until Vista was released.
That threatened to destroy a couple of quarters for HW manufacturers.
That's why they created the certification program. Seems like this is a matter of false advertising, if they sold systems that didn't actually run Vista.
It's bad enough that large organizations like banks, insurance companies and webs sites have all this info on you. But the scariest thing is the fact that the Gov't can get hold of all of the databases and bring the info together all at once. Then they can build all kinds of mapping/statistical programs to monitor your lives either has groups or individuals.
So, much worse than any entity having information on you, the scary thing, is the one entity that can demand access to all other databases and merge the data together.
But, there are a finite number of hours in a school day, and a finite amount of material that parents are willing to let their children learn before they complain that it interferes with the dozen after-school activities that the parents have scheduled.
Learning a 2nd/3rd language is a huge waste of time. What do you really learn by adding a list of words to your brain that is a copy of the words you already know, but in a different language?
Think of the opportunity cost of all thing other things you could have learned instead that would actually help you understand the world around you.
Just pick a language already, any language (does not have to be English). There would be so much saved effort in understanding each other and passing on knowledge between civilizations. Best of all, it would make it harder for politicians to say one thing to one group and something else to another, hiding it based on language differences.
"Everything should be made as simple as possible, but not simpler." -- Albert Einstein