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Comment Re:HP isn't exiting WebOS (Score 2) 121

I've been speculating that they're trying to flood the market with WebOS so they can tell companies who are considering using the platform on their product product things like, "X WebOS devices are currently in use with an estimated user base of Y. Based on sales of WebOS devices from 2011, a projected increase to a user base of Z is expected by Q4 2012." Where X, Y and Z are impressive and rather inflated numbers. Similar to how their server/network hardware support makes them more money than sales of hardware itself, I would expect there to be a lot more money for them in selling and supporting the WebOS platform to 3rd parties.

Comment HostMonster - unlimited space and bandwidth (Score 1) 137

Everyone has their own hosting provider that they prefer. Mine is HostMonster. Hard to argue with unlimited space and bandwidth. Haven't had any issues with uptime in the year I've been hosting with them. They allow SSH access to their hosts (but you have to provide an image of a your drivers license/state ID). Haven't tried to rsync to my server, but then again, I've never had issues using rsync provided I was doing it over ssh (e.g. `rsyc -a -v -e 'ssh -l username' /local/dir hostname:/remote/dir` #going by memory here)

Comment Fancy label (Score 1) 243

I like to think of it in the same way that fancy labels like "fair trade" and "organic" make it onto coffee packaging. Coffee growers with money buy the labels so that it is easier to sell to soccer moms who think they're doing good when in reality, they're giving money to people who already have it.

Signed SSL certificates are a fancy (albeit invisible) label that gets slapped onto your encryption so that a silly warning message that doesn't mean much won't appear in the web browser of a soccer mom. She sees the little "lock" icon, doesn't get a confusing certificate warning message, and is happy to make her purchase on the scams-r-us website because, "Golly-gee! It's $800 less on THIS website!"

Granted I only have a fundamental understanding of signed certificates (this is me admitting that my understanding might be flawed), but unsigned, unique private/public keys are just that, unique. Not any more or any less difficult to crack given the equivalent level of signed keys.

I guess the point I'm trying to make is that (tying my thoughts back to the topic) I can't give a damn. I'm going to have to buy the certificate to appease buyers anyway, so debating the future is moot and I might as well put up with whatever changes they decide to make in the future.

Comment Re:Notebook? (Score 1) 364

While SSDs serve the same function as hard drives, their internal components are much different. Unlike hard drives, SSDs do not have any moving parts (which is why they are called solid state drives).

The read/write head of a notebook has to seek to the right sector of a notebook by turning pages. This requires many moving parts. So no, can't really call it Solid State.

Comment Re:6% is actually very, very high. (Score 1) 437

Numberless is more or less right. It was a pun/bad joke based off of the ambiguity of the wording of the title.

That said, I was also trying to illustrate that that 6% is a bullshit number because the comparison is designed to make numbers sound as low as possible. A VALID and unbiased comparison, imo, would be as follows:

  • Books purchased : non-ebook user
  • Books purchased : ebook user
  • Ebooks purchased : ebook user
  • Ebooks purchased : non-ebook users (unlikly, but will doubtless happen)

What the headline gives us is an incomplete and biased picture.

So, you're both a bit wrong and a bit right.

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