The anchors in question have iPads and are comfortable using them. Microsoft almost certainly paid CNN to have all their anchors use Surface tablets on air, and the anchors probably aren't particularly thrilled that they have to ditch the platform they're comfortable with. I'm sure that now that this (admittedly hilarious) picture has circulated, it will be mandated that CNN anchors not have iPads anywhere near them while on the air.

Ads have been pretending to be part of website user interfaces forever now. A good website would ban those kinds of ads, but Facebook's customers (the advertisers) pay top dollar for unfettered access to Facebook's main commodity (its users). The only way that's ever going to change is if people start to leave Facebook in droves, but unfortunately it's the primary way that Gen X, Gen Y, and older Millenials communicate with each other. It's going to be a couple decades yet before Facebook's primary users age into less valuable advertising demographics, and people have already shown that they're generally unwilling to jump ship for better platforms (Google Plus isn't great, but it's a hell of a lot less obnoxious than Facebook). Me, I deleted my Facebook account several years ago, and have never looked back.

I think it's because cheap hotels are for regular travelers and nice hotels are for people traveling on business who will be reimbursed by their employers. Even for expensive hotels, the prices are pretty minuscule compared to what a big company can afford, so money is really no object for them. So the employees book at expensive hotels because it's kind of a perk of traveling for their company, and private individuals book at cheap ones because that's what they can afford.

Your sarcasm and oversimplification has convinced me that government always bad corporations always good.

I know. We need government interference to tell Fark that they aren't allowed to moderate the content on their own site. If people area allowed to run their privately owned websites the way they choose, it'll be anarchy! Anarchy!!! ANAARRRCCCHHHYYYYY!!!!

...so meaningless as false advertising?

There needs to be an addition to contract law wherein if something is in large print, it trumps anything in small print.

I very rarely run into ads that are aggressive enough to get through AdBlock.

The fact that you're making that comment is a pretty strong statement about the (un)likelihood of that actually happening.

...and desperately attempting to avoid irrelevance.

That being said, there's some sense to the strategy. If it's true that they lost money on the original Xbox, then it's worked for them in the past. Selling products below cost is a good way to get customers, provided your product is good enough that they'll buy your next one at a price where you'll actually profit.

I don't personally see Microsoft tablets being taken seriously (the number of people I see on the internet who apparently like Windows 8 doesn't fit with the number of people I've met who like it in real life, which leads me to believe that they learned a lesson from Vista -- albeit not the right one -- and have seen the value in paying astroturfers to pad their failures a bit). But then again, I didn't expect the XBox to be a runaway success either, and it did just fine, so time will tell.

Fortunately there's enough competition in the tablet market among Apple and all the different Android manufacturers that Microsoft isn't likely to be able to achieve the level of lock-in that they have on the desktop market, which means that another viable tablet maker could actually be a good thing. So even though it's Microsoft, I don't wish them ill here.

You sound like someone who has access to hard data that shows a causative relationship between higher taxes and reduced economic performance. Please post your data; I'd love to see it.

Sure. The NSA scandal was proof of that they've lied and violated the Constitution. On the other hand, I don't see where this is the "worst administration for lies in our lifetime" considering they followed the Bush administration (spoiler: the NSA was doing its spying shit then too).

That being said, about the ACA, promoting the general welfare is specifically constitutional, and there are 7.1 million more people with health care now than there were six months ago (and I'm sorry but "LALALA THE'RE LIARS I CAN'T HEAR YOU" isn't evidence that they're lying about the enrollment figures, no matter how much the irresponsible right wing press may be disingenuously speculating).

Your line of reasoning seems to be "we know they're liars, so that means they're telling a lie. Since they're lying, we know they're liars." Come back with real evidence.

Seriously.

From the article:

an eye-popping 90% increase in just the last month of the six-month open enrollment period.

That's not eye-popping at all. The enrollment numbers didn't even double in the last month. Those number are completely ho-hum, and if anything, I'd expect it to be even more skewed to the last minute.

Sure, this is the worst administration for lies in our lifetime

You're very well-spoken for a five year old.

True, but it's not the center of the solar system or the galaxy.