I think everyone's getting really tired of seeing these articles. It's starting to seem more like a troll attempt than anything valid that needs to be discussed.

I'd agree with you almost entirely except for your subtle compassion for Bell. Telecoms love to claim that the infrastructure is theirs because they built it. The only problem is, in the majority of situations, the tax payers have actually subsidized the infrastructure cost. Even where they haven't they are still permitted to absolute control over assets on government land. It seems pretty brazen to me to insist they can install their infrastructure on public land without oversight.

Bell, Telus, Rogers, and Shaw realize record profits... year over year. This is simply because, together, they enjoy what is the bane of capitalism: monopoly. Individually none of them hold a monopoly, but together they hold a monopolistic cartel over us. This is why I, and everyone else, pays $100+ a month for telecom services. You're smart and stream most of your media? Guess what, they have a plan for that too. I know a few people on the inside that tell me telecoms have open meetings about raising internet service prices to offset (what they call) "cable-cutters".

Our system of government, flawed as it may be, is completely broken by monopolized industry. This is why industries like banking and telecoms are so heavily regulated. I'd agree that regualtion isn't the answer, but not for the same reasons as you do. Regulation in this sense is like putting a bandaid on gangrene.

Ya I'd also like to respectfully decline that offer. We don't really want to deal with that whole Republican party thing you guys have got going on down there.

They're forcing Bell to play fair, which ultimately is good for Canadian citizens as it limits the power of the telecom oligarchy. I would agree that it's far from "common sense" though. Drowning an industry in regulations rather than curing the underlying problem is lazy and short-sighted. If you want my 2c, the entire telecom infrastructure needs to be appropriated and put into the public domain. Maintenance and access to it can then be contracted out, much like we do with traffic infrastructure.

I hate to say itodaso but itodaso... i f*ckin todaso...

Tablets are kinda good for playing Hearthstone. That's the only use I've found so far.

I would, and do, buy the nexus and sony phones. The nexus 4 is upgradable to Android 5.0, and the xperia z1 is still upgradable to 4.4.4 i think.

I don't really understand the rage being directed at Google here. They have fixed the issue in new versions of Android. If they back-ported the fix to 4.3 (assuming that's even possible) what would make carriers/manufacturers implement the fix when they already aren't updating the core version? Nothing. And they wouldn't. The carriers/manufacturers have financially abandoned these older models in favor or their new stuff.

People are used to a big brother company controlling everything about a software experience (Apple, Microsoft). The google approach is open. Unfortunately this requires the user to do a little bit of thinking, make an informed choice, and support the right companies with their money.

At least it wasn't Apple or Facebook. Take your victories where you can.

Sure.

Apple >>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>> Google > Microsoft > Blackberry

I'm not fanboy, but I'd imagine a lot of people feel strongly about supporting the lesser of the two evils in the mobile market.

Corporate IT is very "if it aint broke, don't fix it"., and that's both a good philosophy to have, and one that the emerging IT culture needs to re-adopt. I've worked with many young sysadmins that have what I call "update obsession". Everything always has to be the latest and greatest, and they pay the price for it. Stick with what works. This is the main reason I still use Cisco equipment that runs IOS. IOS hasn't changed much in decades, but it doesn't need to. You configure it, and leave it... for years. This new generation might cringe at the IOS CLI when they're used to web GUIs, but hey... if it aint broke... don't fix it, and Cisco knows that. Someone also needs to bring this philosophy to Microsoft, Google, and Apple. You don't need to reinvent the wheel every 5 years, just because it's been 5 years.

What immediately ticked me off with 10 tech preview was how they hide creating a normal account on the local SAM database. They are really trying to force Microsoft accounts and the cloud down everyone's throat. They need to f*ck off with that immediately if they want any attention from the enterprise.

This. Port your entire project to Java/MariaDB and then you never have to ask this question again. Make your life easy and build your forms with netbeans.

Netbeans makes working with swing forms a breeze. I'd like to vote for java as well.