If MS drops support for all the Polycom Lync devices including conference speakerphones and desk phones, Bluetooth Lync headsets, etc, Corporate will be a hard sell.

Best of Lync and Skype should not obsolete all the business telcom hardware products in use by corporate users. That would be dropping the most useful parts.

I don't wear headphones all the time. I don't have disruptive speakers, and I can still hear my phone ring, and answer it, even while the PC is in a locked screensaver, in hibernation, or even rebooting.. Not all my job is screen time.

Do you ever reboot? Lock the screen and step out? Read a paper list, drawing, manual, or report?

Missing calls while not watching the screen or have another app on top is unacceptable.

Lync can be used with communications headsets. UN-checking the option to use the sound device only for communications permits using the headset for Lync as well as for all other PC sound playback.

The best option in my opinion is to use a desk phone for Lync calls. Polycom makes some nice ones as well as Snom. Alternate firmware can change the SIP phone into an OCS VOIP phone able to integrate with your Lync account. Search for Snom OCS firmware for more info.
Desk phone, speaker phone, or headset is your choice.

The main reason peers block Comcast by deafult is the number of vunerable XP machines that get hijacked to send spam. Dropping mail from home users has almost no false positives. Mail if permitted by peers would increase the number of botnet attempts to send bulk spam. The fact the mail is blocked makes compromised Comcast user's machines much less valuable.

Even home configured business accounts on static IP addresses do not have a super good IT department to prevent compromised machines becoming part of a spam botnet, which is a good reason to not accept mail from home IP blocks.

The point is after the education market, business is mostly non Apple. The exceptions are media production and related fields. Mobile media (tablets) should belong to Apple, but Android at lower price points has higher unit sales.

Google Chrome is poised to do to MS PC's what Android did to Apple Tablets and phones.

Early in the PC vs Apple days, Apple was heavy into the education market as the theory went as kids lift school they would continue to use what they learned in school.

Apple faced the reality of aftermarket gray box PC's running DOS, then Windows at a lower price embraced by business. Microsoft rode in on commodity hardware.

Now Windows and the support structure is high priced and Google is doing the Apple playbook getting into schools with an easy to use, secure platform, but with a price advantage. This could go somewhere. There is not much cheap platform hardware that can out perform the inexpensive hardware and software.

The only Achilles heel is the underpowered nature, but with proper growth, that could soon end. Chrome is not an enterprise platform, yet.

Not sure why, but auto spellcheck doesn't work on this site for me. Works on other sites.

Some employers want more than your diploma. They want to know what certifications you obtained and your ability to answer questions on the fly at the interview. Microsoft and Google interview questions come to mind. Can you problem solve?

Industry knowledge is very helpful. For the telcom people out there, do you have a CFC certificate (USA)? On one of my jobs requiring a clearance to enter the facility, this is a plus. The ability to give the managed network switch logs and the HVAC logs in one trip can separate basic trained and experianced skilled. Some employers will ask not only what software tools you are trained on, but want to know what tools you have in your tool kit. If you have a tone kit, crimpers, and a scope meter, they may expect you to be able to solve the software problems and check the actual port samples on the hardware.

Some engineers are just plain dangerous with a screwdriver. One that has a torque screwdriver and knows the tork to use on DB connectors, bay screws, and so on will get a job ahead of one that just has MSIE certifications. In the US even explaining a JIS screwdriver and why you have one can separate you from the other canidates.

How many of you just Googled JIS screwdriver?

How many of you already have one?

One item that is a possibility wasn't mentioned. It could be simply collison avoidance instead of jamming. Fear of a high speed collsision would make most any animal pause. Is it loss of targeting, or avoiding a high speed crash?

Temp agencies seem to be worse. They offer the worst health care and 401K plans in existance.

A health plan that has NO out of pocket maximum? That only has the Maximum it will pay instead, such as $25/ per perscription, $250 for a hospital stay, etc. Seriously, this protects the employee none against any high cost medical needs. Anyone who has had a medical stay at a hospital and seen the bill will know that $250 for the visit barely dents the bill. Diabetic? $25 for your supplies and perscription is only a small co pay the insurance pays, not really protecting the employee with any meaningful insurance. Seriously, I would be far ahead to self insure at the rate the insurance pays in the event of any medical need. Why pay the premium for a plan that pays next to nothing?

On a tem agency 401K, I reviewed a plan that has 0 employer contributions and a $250/quarter maintenance fee on top of some other fees. Seriously, with fees like that brudening the account, how the **** is it possible to grow enough equity to earn enough interest to even cover the fees, let alone grow. I hate to say it, but a 401K in a Passbook savings account would be much wiser as the account is not heavly erroded by fees.

When consioering a temp agency, be sure to examine their "Health Plan" and "401K" offerings. Many of the benifits are worse than no offering at all.

Take any offerings and see your finincial planner. They will be able to direct you into plans with much less damaging fees.

Your benifit plans should not be a huge liability.

I wonder if they are knowedgable of the Streisand effect and the Slashdot effect. If not, they will know now. LOL. The news of the request is more important news than any old review they were trying to escape.

Or how much of the volcanic activity in the area is miss-labeled as human activity. Seriously, how much of this is volcamic ash?

Sensational story with the facts totally wrong conclusion is what I see. How much is volcanic? No EDX of the material on the snow was even considered. Is ir carbon from forest fires or silicon dioxode volcanic dust?

I have 3 options..

1 The affordable health plan under the contract employeer. It consists of a plan that limits the plan's maximum payments. Limits include Max of $20 for a perscripiton. Max of 250 for a hospital stay. and the list goes on. If you have ever stayed in a hospital or are diabetic, you will find your maximum out of pocket is the sky is the limit. The plan protects the insurance, not you against any expensive proceedure such as any surgery, MRI, etc.

2 Cobra, limited in duration.. till you find other insurance. Well over $1500/month for family coverage for a high deductable plan. Maximum out of pocket for the plan, $6000. If you need medical services, your maximum is over 2,000/month. Wife had surgery and cancer treament this year.. This left little expendable or discreciionsary income. The Mortgauge, car insurance, and utilities took the rest. No savings this year.

3 Open market.. Your competitive market for insurance. Full coverage high deductable retiree plans start at $2800/month. I won't be able to afford that until my house is paid off in about 20 years.

This leaves me the reality of No coverage in about a year, or quitting work and selling the house to get on Obama Care.

This trickles down to the US workers too. Here is how it works.

In a downsize you become unemployed. In looking for work, most openings are either entry level or contract positions with no benifits.

You earn too much to be eligable for Obama Care and the company plan is employee paid. If you have a spouse without employment, a mortguage, and need health care, there is a distinct lack of family wage jobs that isn't sucked dry by insurance in excess of 2K/Month. My COBRA insurance is higher than the mortgauge. This payment pretty much sucks up all expendable income normally used for living expenses.

Many younger workers simply forgo the insurance payments. Older workers don't have this option.

Most of those billions of codes are easly circumvented by a replay attack. The cure is to lock and unlock your car with a physical key to prevent reading of the code. The other step is to add a switch to simply turn off the RF trancievers in the car when parking it in an unsecure location. A replay attack will fail when the RF is OFF.

Thanks for the info. I haven't switched to Hangouts yet because it only works on Chrome so It requires a browser switch.

For worldwide users another competitor is the open standard SIP. Many manufactures have SIP (VOIP) phones and adapters, and many with free SIP service. Unlike Skype many of the SIP registars permit multiple resistrations (extensions) at the same time, so I can have a phone at home and at work. A call rings both just like Google Voice. Inexpensive calling plans can be added if needed from Free US DID through IPKall or Callcentric, or other providers + trunk lines for outgoing calls. SIP to SIP is always free world wide. Some SIP providers provide video too like Skype if desired.