The clue was where I said Surface Pro 2/3. It sits somewhere between the 2 and 3 in terms of spec. It has a similar form factor as the 3, a choice of i3/i5 processor, similar storage and RAM options and a resolution of the Surface 2. It's a lot cheaper and comes with proper chiclet keyboard which also adds some extra ports and speakers.

I haven't had such problems with the Miix. My biggest gripe is the touch pad doesn't have software for me to set up gestures (e.g. vertical scroll), and the keyboard stand is perfectly fine for desks but it isn't much good for perching in bed - it's too easy for the tablet to topple forward.

RT was a stillborn concept from the beginning. Windows without Windows compatibility is a stupid idea. It was even worse for having a desktop mode and all that bloat as a kludge to support a half baked port of MS Office.

Perhaps it might have enjoyed more success if they had added x86 emulation and LLVM-esque runtime support to Visual Studio and C++ so a large portion of desktop apps could be recompiled for it.

It's similarly specced to a Surface Pro 2/3 but considerably cheaper and includes a keyboard. I think by far the biggest issue with the Surface Pro is the keyboard is a pricey extra for an already pricey tablet.

If they bundled the keyboard with these things they'd sell a hell of a lot more of them. They're not bad devices, just too expensive. And let's be blunt, Windows without a keyboard is worse than fucking useless.

Thanks for the link. Yes exactly that sort of thing.

Not necessarily. The FBI could have supplied Google & Microsoft with a long list of md5 / sha1 hashcodes for abuse images which they obtained in raids or forums and these providers have programmed their system to raise a flag whenever they get a hit. Then a human might go in to confirm the match and from there its just a matter of informing the police. It may well be there are other ways of "fingerprinting" an image that are more resilient than a hash code and still useful enough for matching pictures against a known set of bad ones.

Perhaps it will come out in the trial how the file was identified.

Anyway it's more proof (if any were needed) why it's an incredibly bad idea to use a cloud service to store anything illegal. At least encrypt the data. Better yet don't put it up there at all.

I'm sorry but parents DO have a right to complain. Apple / Google / Microsoft are facilitators of a system which not only encourages but profits from games charging money for in-app purchases. It means that the controls are begrudging implemented and usually flipped to off position by default. And it is not hard to find games aimed at young kids where the game encourages the player to purchase $50-100 bundles of coins, skins or whatever. They don't want to tip the applecart so to speak.

And yeah parental responsibility does come into it but so does the power of the default. The default for kid rated games should be purchase restrictions. If the account holder wants to flip it the other way they can do so, but that should be the default. And in being the default it would change the landscape of these games for the better since they'd have to focus on engaging game play instead of skinner box random rewards for cash as they do now.

Thanks Ayn for completely understanding the problem.

Impose a maximum in-game purchase to the game's rating and impose a maximum spend per account per month. i.e. an E for everyone game may have a max spend of $5. If a user wants to override these settings then they can from the account settings. The power of the default mean the majority won't and thus people will be protected from nasty surprises. Oh and ban more than 1 in game currency that maps onto real world money and require them to show a dollar / euro / pound value against any purchase that uses it.

Aside from protecting users it deters games from being glorified skinner boxes with cow-clicker complexity and micropayments galore and encourages producers to start making actual games again.

The Wii U is the filling in a shit sandwich. On one side it has the PS3 & 360 which are technically comparable yet cheaper and have a massive catalogue of games and industry support. On the other side they have the PS4 and XB1 which are technically superior, rapidly picking up steam and have industry support. They're in the middle with no industry support and few if any reasons to justify themselves to consumers over other choices.

The problem is fundamentally one of Nintendo's own making. They cynically set out to make the lowest spec console they could get away (basically parity with the PS3/360) and charged a premium for a gimmick. Consumers didn't buy it (probably remembering the Wii, remote, balance board + assorted shit gathering dust in the cupboard) and without the sales the 3rd parties slipped away.

A single title like MarioKart is a shot in the arm but it can't turn the ship around by itself. Nintendo will have to hope they can keep throwing out good titles for long enough that sales pick up and some 3rd parties come back. Personally I think they should be looking to emerging markets and price their console at those markets.

Because open & open source consoles have such a long and glorious history. And I include forcibly opened consoles in that list, those which have been cracked.

Opening the console up either voluntarily or involuntarily would be the final nail in the coffin for their platform.

The main problem with The Hobbit is (as Bilbo might say) it feels thin, like butter scraped over too much toast. There's too little story to work with to justify 3 3-hour movies.

Maybe Peter Jackson will release a limited abbreviated edition on Blu Ray to make up for this. Anyway the middle instalment was pretty good (thanks to Smaug) though both it and the first movie are guilty of some utterly pointless detours and WTF moments particularly any time Radaghast appeared on screen.

In practice Android has several reputable stores - Google & Amazon Appstore and there is a second tier of stores which some standard of validation / vetting Samsung Apps, GetJar, F-droid, Appslib, SlideME etc.

At the end of the day, android gives users the freedom to choose where they get apps from. But freedom implies the freedom to do stupid things. It won't stop a user installing warez if they want, but if they get owned it's their own damned fault. Not much different from what happens on a PC or Mac really.

That said I don't think Android does enough to protect users from malicious or rogue apps, e.g. allowing the device to deny a permission to the app even if it claims to need it. Cyanogenmod demonstrates it can be added, but Google haven't seen fit to provide that functionality in the stock android code.

I bet virtually all malware on Android originates not from the official store but from idiots downloading and install apks from the wild or some dodgy Chinese app store - "this cracked Candy Crush says it needs access to make calls, send & receive SMS messages, access to my contacts, my Google accounts and email but I really want to play so I'm going to click through this obvious red flag and wonder later why my phone is calling premium numbers in Ouagadougou at 3am and why I have 10 missed calls from Visa loss prevention".

I'm pretty certain Google has systems in place (as well as an after the fact kill function) to eradicate malicious apps that find their way onto the app store. Doubtless there are some there but they're background noise.

Cell carriers don't have to distribute it. Google could use their Play service and patch devices regardless of what the carrier did. They could even scan devices for active use of the exploit.