Then how do you explain google chat? and google voice?

The way you state that makes it sound like some nefarious immoral thing to support the mod community. And I'll challenge just about every point you make. Google gets NO income from Android? Why do they bother, then? And I'll point you to the PS3 as an example of companies changing the functionality of a device even after release. You're assuming that the manufacturers of the hardware care more about jailbreaking than do the developers of the OS, while exactly the opposite is true. Jailbreaking allows piracy, which decreases the incentive for freelance developers to develop apps for the OS. Less apps means less public interest in the platform, which means handset manufacturers will simply pick another OS for their hardware. Only the OS guys lose out, HTC wouldn't care at all. --- Perversely, by supporting the mod community, Google has created MORE interest in Android, not less. That's the way I like to see businesses making money. Find a way to make cash by giving consumers what they want, not by locking them in.

None of that is neccesary. For a while I dispaired that Google was going the way of Apple, but they have since worked with Cyanogen and released all the apps as a seperate installable .zip file. The only difference is that you need to flash two zips instead of 1. A company working WITH a mod guy to solve his problems and let him do his thing!? What is the world coming to. I've tried a million different ROMs, and Cyanogen is teh BOM in my opinion. I've still got an old Magic (Sapphire, G2, or whatever they keep naming the same device), and every time a new version of Cyanogen comes out it's like getting a new handset. It's awesome. ;-)

Alkaline batteries, like Hydrogen Fuel Cells, are a storage medium for energy. It is not an energy source, and is not in any way related to this discussion.

It's a common misconception that foreign owners of local business exploit the country by keeping all the profits. I'm not a mining expert, but even if my figures are wildly off base I think I can still make my point. Lets say that the profit of a mining house in Afghanistan is 10%, that means that 90% of all wealth created by the company remains in the country. This is in the form of bought goods and services, labor, and taxes. So while it is true that all the "profit" leaves the country in a 100% owned American company, most of the wealth stays in the country. No matter how you look at it, extracted minerals will be VASTLY better for Afghanistan than leaving it in the ground. And if they need foreign help to get going so be it. The way foreign companies have shifted this balance of benefit unfairly in the past is by a) buying all the goods and services (and a lot of the labor) from their own country b) paying the locals very low wages c) selling the product back to themselves at very low prices This means that very little money is spent INSIDE the country, and very little profit (if any) is made by the sale of product, so no taxes goes to the government. This is pure exploitation and most of the created wealth leaves the country. Assuming someone learn't from history and negotiates an ethical agreement, this is good for the country. If the government accepts a bribe and allows the above to happen, its a different matter. American wealth and living standards these days depend on this sort of "shrewd" business negotiations. Where do your responsibility to your stockholders end and your responsibility to foreign citizens begin? What would you be willing to give up in terms of living standards to have the warm fuzzy feeling that someone somewhere in Afghanistan (that probably hates your guts) has something to eat and somewhere to sleep tonight? It's easy to blame big business, but I've found that the overwhelming majority of people would be even less ethical in their own dealings, and would never accent to the flip side of the coin. "BAN DIRTY OIL COMPANIES!" (but don't DARE raise the cost of fuel for my Hummer!) K

It wasn't a "normal" month. ;-) FREEDOM!!! It was nice to experience it for a month. Now it's back to normal. It's not really relevant to compare SA usage to what this topic line is, as we ALWAYS have to consider the additional cost of download, whereas the main poster is trying to establish "typical" use without these constraints. I don't think there really is such a thing. The variance would be too big for you to base your usage on what others are doing, even in the same country or industry. If you like downloading movies on usenet or torrents, your usage would be orders of magnitude larger than those who only browse and download the occasional driver. Ditto for Linux users who always like to be up to date (medium usage) or those who always like to try out the latest distros and compare it to their standard Ubuntu box (heavy users). So best is to measure yourself over a "normal" month, and see what you get. My measurement always gets skewed by normal network traffic between the PCs in my home. You could probably seperate BW based on subnet destinations, but I've never been that interested. I try to manage my monthly bill, but other than that... Cheers! K