A/B testing, as a concept, is fine. The issue here is that A was "truth" and B was "deception", and that's something you shouldn't be A/B testing (at least not without getting ethics waivers signed). Facebook provided feeds that were not representative of what was actually going on and OKCupid flipped bad matches to good matches, both of which compromised their relevant services by misleading users or misrepresenting information. You can't do stuff like that in most (all?) ethical systems, and it may even open them up to legal trouble, since they're knowingly providing something other than the promised service.

At the very least, their doing so runs contrary to the categorical imperative, so for any deontological ethicists out there, it should seem pretty apparent that they were out of line. And if you subscribe to more consequentialist ethical thinking, such as utilitarianism (either the Act or Rule variety), it's trivial to point out that the users were going to obviously be worse off in several of these cases and that happiness was not maximized, nor would it be if everyone was misleading their users like this.

Again, A/B testing is a great tool, but it needs to be used ethically.

The internal "SD Card" is formatted with a Unix-style file system that provides access controls to keep apps from being able to access one anothers' data. External SD Cards are formatted with FAT32, because that's what the whole world expects. Unfortunately, FAT has no concept of ownership or permissions, so the path-based restriction is necessary to ensure that apps can't muck with each others' data.

It's too late now, but if this device had been encrypted before it was broken, you'd have a lot less to worry about.

OTOH, it's worth pointing out that if the level of effort required to find the storage on the broken device so you can wipe or destroy it is too much to bother with, it will almost certainly be too much effort for anyone to go through the same effort in order to retrieve your data, on the off chance there might be something of value in there somewhere.

Indeed. When the market doesn't suit your niche, get a peripheral that does the trick. And I say "niche", because Bennett failed to take note of some rather obvious selection bias that, when taken into account, seems to cause his results to actually suggest the opposite of what he's claiming.

Namely, slide-out keyboards have never been ubiquitous across a class of phone in the way that touchscreen keyboards are nearly ubiquitous across smartphones today. So while nearly everyone using a smartphone today has been forced to use a touchscreen at some point, users who have used slide-out keyboards did so because they specifically chose that style of keyboard, given that there were plenty of comparable alternatives available back when slide-out keyboards were more common.

Which is to say, rather than being a random sampling, the respondents to this survey were likely all people who had a strong preference for slide-out style keyboards at some point in time. That only a hair more than half of the people who preferentially chose them in the past still prefer them just a few years later is actually rather damning evidence against slide-out keyboards.

More or less, Bennett has failed to take into account people who considered slide-out keyboards and chose not to buy them for any one of a number of valid reasons that do not require having used them (e.g. makes the phone thicker, can't switch between alphabets/character sets, don't want to add more mechanical points of failure, etc.). I don't think he did it intentionally, but the outcome is that he's loaded the deck in his favor, yet still only barely managed to get the results he wanted.

Lol. Mine are all fucked up.

My first G2 (the one that the G2 root was developed on) managed to stay in good shape, and I gave it away to someone signed, but the ones after all had that damned hinge break.

I've got 3 G1s with dead keyboards in my room, right now.

I still love them, but I can't honestly attest to their build quality

I have to call you out on call-gates.
They suck. That's why Linux didn't use them (int 0x80). That's why Windows NT didn't use them (int 0x2e), though they did use them on the 16/32 hybrid "dos-like" kernels ;). That's why *BSD didn't use them (int 0x80). That's why OSX doesn't use them (int 0x80).
Cache locality is horrible, the far pointer requires more bytes/instruction, and segment registers suck- especially when running in protected mode. (see: protected mode paging)

The "DOS-style" syscalls you're referring to are a software interrupt trap, (also called a trap-gate). Every OS worth mentioning used them prior to SYSENTER being introduced.

I think he cleverly manipulated you into making his point for him.
A rant against your language of choice has nothing to do with humility.

It's as linux as linux can be...

I'm sure you know that Torvalds et al., didn't write the userspace you're referring to as "Linux".

Android is another open-source OS running on the Linux open source kernel. It is Linux.

Also, there is no kernel in existence with greater market share on "end-user" devices than Linux. None. My TV runs it, my Blu-ray player runs it, my little TV dongle runs it, my router runs it, my little cheapy off-the-shelf SAN runs it, my cell phone runs it, the damn IPMI firmware on my machine runs it... Unless of course Linux + busybox is also "not Linux", then I guess nothing runs Linux except for Desktop PCs.

We actually do *not* blame Netflix. We just get real scared at people calling draconian restrictions on us managing the limited network assets we have "Net Neutrality".

The only thing I blame Netflix for is misconstruing this fight for free peering on their terms as Network Neutrality.

Real Net Neutrality is a serious issue. Preventing eyeball networks from shaping their traffic to fit their aggregate needs lest they infringe on some fictional right of a content provider? Simply ridiculous.

BTW, yes, their solution was fair and good. Now, what if Netflix were able to demand that your university ISP expand their network infrastructure to accomodate said throttling, or demand that your university ISP peer with them, or demand that they upgrade their backbone links. What if they simply didn't have the funds for it, or the aggregate will of the customer base (you) was not in favor of that allocation of funds?

Now, what if *any* content providing network could do this?

Must I really implement throttling across my entire customer base when 10% of them use 90% of the bandwidth?

From my perspective, it's perfectly reasonable for either Netflix *or* the ISP to demand one or the other side pay for a private peering link. Who that is that pays should be dependent on who has the facts on the ground for both networks and their effected customer bases. I can't be forced to peer with every content provider that wants to peer with me. And Netflix surely doesn't allow me to set the terms of free peering with them. I have to follow the will of my customers and the reality of the total market.

Finally, being Netflix has a ways to go before hitting 254 million subscribed customers, I find it unlikely that their customers represent the majority in any ISP's network. They certainly weren't in mine. If my customer base is unwilling to pay for network expansion for Netflix, and Netflix doesn't want to either, guess what. I'm throttling them.

Oh I completely agree my customers should have the last say. You are not one of my customers, and judging from the assertion you just made, the aggregate demands of my customers were fed to you by Netflix, and not my customers.

And yet the rules you're proposing apply to these "microISPs" (of which I am the senior network engineer of one), and the last bastion of a free market in the US ISP market. Having to accomodate Netflix was not easy for us (until they started doing open peering at our local IX- we're fortunate enough to have a presence at one). Previously, we did not meet their private peering guidelines (wait- what's this? Netflix is allowed to set limits on who they will peer with??!! but.. but.. Net Neutrality!) and they were *crushing* our other upstreams, that were far more than adequate for all other use, minus Netflix.

Maybe you think we podunk ISPs have no place in the large world of monopolistic ISPs... My customers will be smiling at you with their Gbps FTTH connections. I hope you really enjoy your Comcast, because once you give content provides more power than free-market eyeball networks over management of our network and cost structures, you've killed us once and for good.

Correct.

But you'll notice there is no law authorizing the former, and a law directly prohibiting the latter.

Using this information, which is the default permissibility of their right to refuse service?

Don't be ridiculous. The dinosaurs lived long before the GNU utils were written. They would have been compressed.

In many cases... yes. The most expensive phones have an up-front cost in addition to the two-year commitment, but if you get the most expensive phone you can without an up-front fee, then there is no price difference between that one and the cheapest phone.

Yes, this is ridiculous.

Of course a contract places an obligation on both parties. But criminal law still doesn't factor into it. You're simply wrong.
Look up what tort is.

Finally, speaking to criminal law: Yes they can.

Also, to repeat, the guy would have a valid tort claim however.