Actually the reason calculators still exist is that you can just use them without booting up, updating, installing etc. Its the same reason you have a television still rather than just using a computer to do the job. If calculators ever disappear, then this planet is doomed.

Realistically, CAS functionality is easier on paper and do you really need graphing? If you actually know what you are doing, pen, paper and a 15 year old Casio scientific is enough for pretty much everything. Failing that, grab a TI Nspire CAS. Very fast, does more than a TI84 or TI89. I use an HP50g myself but that's a different beast and my primary use case is RPL. Don't use a computer - you can't just grab it, use it and put it down.

Because it's harder to retrospectively fuck you over then as a license holder.

As much as I hate Microsoft, I'm behind them here. Perhaps they should just drop all their apps suddenly and promote the Android and Windows Phone versions?

It's blocked on O2.

My contract is up on 19th January. I will vote with my feet. I'll switch to Andrews & Arnold who publicly state that they don't censor, filter and track. It's a whopping £4 a month more.

Everyone knows about the holes, including the manufacturers. They're designed to operate on controlled, private networks. Every time someone gets hacked, they should go after the implementors, not the vendors as they should factor security onto their site designs. I'm not excusing the manufacturers, just people need to know this is engineering and not infosec - people buy black boxes which do stuff and that's all that matters to them.

Why did you insist on integrating Amazon searches into the product despite users' concerns and complaints to the contrary? A large body of users including myself consider this to be abhorrent and a step back to the dark ages of sponsored software (remember Bonzi Buddy)?

Ha I actually weed myself. Thats the price of getting old.

Considering the economic model drives the social outcome, particularly where capital is pushed to controlling class, I'm pretty much on the dot. I did economics back in the distant past, so I'm not ignorant of how everything slots together.

These firms are very quiet about what they really do. The job description, company web site and agent were all pointing to something different. They were also pretty much avoiding trying to tell me what the job involved as well.

Oh the shock of the moral high ground.

You've obviously never been interrogated by customs then even if you've done nothing?

What's the deal with turkey fryers? I've always done them in the oven.

Well not strictly true. I'm not sure the Western propaganda is "fit for purpose" and derives from the cold war paranoia. They did some horrible things (just like the US and UK governments for example and the whole perpetual state of war), but they were mostly quite reasonable apparently[1]. My father, an ex East German shouted much worse things than that at them in 1976 after pissing up the side of a Stasi vehicle and getting arrested. As a repeated offender, he was gently booted over the border to West Germany then to the UK and lived in relative comfort until I came along and ruined it for him! He's always bitter that they kept his television as it took him 5 years to save up for it.

[1] My comment towards the prospective employer was to rile them up about it rather than be factual.

Hardly. If you read about the Stasi, they were actually a self-perpetuating elite rather than state police. The moment you give anyone power, they devolve into an elite. It's an unfortunate part of human nature.

Yes. I can see the religious programming now:

"Looks like Bin Laden" - HRESULT_FULL_CAVITY_SEARCH

"Has hook instead of hand" - HRESULT_FULL_CAVITY_SEARCH

"Darker than a bag of flour" - HRESULT_FULL_CAVITY_SEARCH

"Has Koran instead of Bible" - HRESULT_FULL_CAVITY_SEARCH

"Has Casio F91-W watch" - HRESULT_STRAIGHT_TO_GITMO

In a capitalist society, a divide develops and society falls into those who control and those who are controlled. This software exists to enable and reinforce that divide by criminalising people.

Regarding maturity, do you find it unacceptable that someone should be principled and express that verbally? Sometimes "fuck you" is the best answer.