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Comment Re:The actual damages... (Score 2) 647

If I get caught taking an audio CD from WalMart without paying, I MIGHT get a $50-200 fine. If I download those same 12 songs that were on the CD without paying and get caught, I may get charged $1000-15000 per song, that is about $100000-150000 total. How is the damages from one about 50000X more than the other? I "took" the SAME thing.

Comment The World Almanac (Score 1) 647

I love them.
- Hours and hours of cool information.
- Wildly different topics and "storylines" throughout the book. If you have no interest in a specific section, you can skip to the next section.
- You don't have to read it in an order
- Small and easy to carry around.

No really, a World Almanac!
http://www.worldalmanac.com/world-almanac.aspx

Comment Re:This is why (Score 1) 231

I watch most of my TV shows through Comcast on Demand. They seem to have about 1/2 the commercials compared to the broadcast version. I can still skip through them but I'm sure they can prevent me from doing that in the future. Similar to what I've seen on Hulu, a 30 second commercial here and there

Comment Re:Skeptical (Score 1) 78

Facebook has very little to lose and much to gain from getting into various hardware. This phone sales when compared to quantity sold of other models could be a bust but the real goal is not total sales. The more devices on the street that have Facebook integration, the harder or less likely people will be to switch to a competing social network. Think of all of the media boxes and internet connected televisions, blue ray players etc that have things like embedded like Netflix and Facebook. All of the companies with a Facebook presence, the +1 links etc.. IMO, this is why Netflix kept the the Netflix name on the streaming service and renamed the mail order spinoff. Facebook is turning into something similar to what AOL was, a semi walled interconnected community with some central control. They are building it in the other direction though, from open to closed.

Comment Re:Moderation system (Score 1) 763

I pay very little to no attention to a posts current mod status. I read through the sub threads that catch my eye and give a reply when I have something to add. I don't care if I'm replying to a +5 or a 0. I normally browse at 0 and I rarely see an obviously non troll post rated at 0 so I assume there is even less at -1. Temporary moderators are not picked because of their opinions so if groupthink or common trends are modded down, it truly is what a majority of people on /. would agree with. Not that I think people should moderate with opinion and I try not to but it does happen and different people view different comments differently. That's why I don't pay much very little attention to a comments current mod. As long as moderation system gets rid of the obvious trolls and spammers which it does, I'm perfectly happy with it. I do my part as well and post without the Karma bonus and let the system take my post where ever it needs to go.

Comment Re:Like the alternative is so much better (Score 1) 315

Mortgage companies are required to state to you the percentage of loans they sell and I think the average time frame they hold a mortgages for or basically, the likelihood of your mortgage being sold. I seem to remember being explained that and signing something to that effect when I refinanced my house about 10 years ago.

Pick a lender that is less likely to sell it off? Of course their numbers or percentages could change drastically after you have your mortgage.

Comment Re:to hell with the internet (Score 1) 318

hundreds of millions of people do provide all that information to social networking sites without having their identities stolen should give you one clue

But not a single person that used a fake name had anything stolen. If I could use a fake name and address on my credit cards, my electric bill, any online shopping site, and with my bank, I would.

Comment Re:False advertising (Score 1) 160

It might just be that Comcast and Verizon have much better peering partners (with respect to the targets of the tests) than Cablevision.

The uplink is part of the whole internet package that its customers are paying for and the service they expect. If their peering sucks and they have slow uplinks, maybe they should upgrade them or stop advertising 20mbps service when they absolutely know they can barely support 50% of that for many hours every day of the week. What stops Cablevision from offering a 40mbps service for more money knowing they can't support that either? It is unfair for the customers.

Comment Re:False advertising (Score 1) 160

You can guarantee anything. If the guarantee is not met, you hand out some previously agreed on compensation. Without those checks and balances, the advertised rates are useless. For this scenario, Comcast and Verizon were able to maintain a certain speed to random sites that random users visited as a whole with their network but why couldn't Cablevision? The only two explanations are Cablevision users are going to vastly different sites online then Verizon and Comcast users OR Cablevision is grossly overrating and overselling their service cheating their customers.
That is the whole point of this FCC test.

Comment Re:close, but no cigar.. (Score 1) 210

The problem for the non technical folks, they still have a very weak link. Most hotel, cafe etc wireless is wide open and unencrypted. A boost disk like this and an encrypted ttunnel that you can connect to would be more useful. Why don't hotels at least use WPA and have the key displayed the default hotel tv channel or on a small sheet of paper when they hand you the room key or something. That would better than wide open although it might cause some support headaches.

Comment Already exist... (Score 1) 228

There are laws that allow the prosecution of people that fraud and steal. There are existing practices and best methods to increase security and protect valuable data on public facing internet sites and intranets.

Passing yet another law and adding a "monitor layer" in at the internet pipe or DNS level in an attempt to limit hacking and stealing does not make sense (specially one controlled by the government or special interests) and will not work any better than existing methods.

This is another attempt at corporations trying to get the taxpayers to foot the bill for their own security and to help maintain their business models and their own negligent lack of security.
Why are my tax dollars going to protect the music and movie industries? Why is it being spent tracking down knock-off purses and rogue network switching gear? Why is being spent to help BOA improve their security?

Crime

FBI Seizes Servers In Virginia 405

Axolotl_Rose writes "The FBI has seized servers belonging to several clients of a hosting company in Reston, VA, disrupting service for many other clients. 'In an e-mail to one of its clients on Tuesday afternoon, DigitalOne’s chief executive, Sergej Ostroumow, said: “This problem is caused by the FBI, not our company. In the night FBI has taken 3 enclosures with equipment plugged into them, possibly including your server — we cannot check it.” Mr. Ostroumow said that the FBI was only interested in one of the company’s clients but had taken servers used by “tens of clients.” He wrote: “After FBI’s unprofessional ‘work’ we can not restart our own servers, that’s why our Web site is offline and support doesn’t work.” The company’s staff had been working to solve the problem for the previous 15 hours, he said.'"

Comment Re:Verizon won't roll them out to kiosks. . . (Score 1) 412

I do not agree. The days of an physical desktop in the enterprise with all of your "stuff" on it are going away. The enterprises are moving in the direction of virtual machines and virtual applications. This provides the user with a BYOC (bring your own computer) option and still provide them with a consistent interface and a "computer" to them regardless of where they are connecting to it from, it could be their home laptop running XP, Windows 7, Apple, iPad, or even Linux, their moms desktop, an android device, some thin client on their desk at work. All they need is the receiver software installed on some compatible device which is a simple install and some type of network connectivity (an example here).

It is not a one size fits all, the dust is still settling and there are some issues that are a little less mature like checking out that virtual desktop or virtual applications and using them remotely without network connectivity but it will be solved.

I think this concept will start to break people away from the MS stranglehold where people want the same software products they have at home that they have at work. You will no longer NEED MS office at home or even to run Windows because you want to work from home and be productive. No more Citrix Presentation server where the apps are slightly different the icons are not the same as you "work" computer. No more GoToMyPC or what ever to connect to that physical desktop at your desk that you are familiar with.

People will not need native methods like MS office/Outlook etc on their tablet or phone any more to do work related stuff.
           

AT&T

Ask Slashdot: Best Smartphone Plan For a US Vacation? 200

SJrX writes "I am planning on visiting the Pacific Northwest for several weeks, and was looking for the best smartphone option available. Roaming data rates and SMS rates are ridiculously high (best plans are $0.80 / MB, and $0.75 / message). Beyond AT&T and Verizon Prepaid, are there any other options? (I'm on an iPhone 4 so GSM is a must.) I assume in the US, I have no credit history for which to qualify for a plan, and a contract is obviously out of the question. Data and SMS are the only important things, with a few hundred minutes being plenty. I'm only planning on being in the US for 2 or 3 weeks, but mainly in rural areas (US Route 101) so large (3G) coverage is important."

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