Nope. The solution for XP expiring is Linux.

The equivalent for Andoid is to require the boot loader to be unlocked for free if there is no free availability of security updates. Then you can use the ROM of your choice. It is open source, so people can, and probably will, fix bugs if there is still a significant user base*. If not unlocked, then Google or the manufacturer is wilfully converting the phone landfill, and should be billed accordingly.

Clearly, this needs to be a legal right. There is a remote chance of this in Europe, but probably none in the USA - there are no consumer rights in the land of the free.

* I would argue that the source (and data sheet) for device drivers should be compulsorily released to public domain where the hardware manufacturer is not maintaining them.

Adult phone users have slightly more grownup expectations: If the hardware is not busted, then the phone should be fixable by the end user following a viable procedure - eg taking it to the local phone shop.

We do not need any more landfill.

I have two Android phones, one running the latest software available for it - the other, CM. I also use two Nokias that are 5 and 8 years old. My computer has been regulary upgraded, but is, in the vewi of most of my family, over 10 years old (runs Linux Mint). If Android phones have a very short life, I wont be buying more of them, considering the extremely high price.

If Google do not address security risks, then their market share means this is a National Security Risk and I expect my government to act - using RPGs and nuking from high orbit if required.

However, if this security failing leads to a major loss of money or privacy for Android users, I suspect Google could be on the recieving end of a multi-gazillion dollar class action.

And so could the handset manufacturers.

This is going to be so big, the lawyers wont bother laughing all the way to the bank - the banks will come to them.

At best, their excuse can be summarized as "we can fix this for some users, but not all, therefore we are not going to fix it at all".

My widely distributed product has been discovered to have a serious security flaw affecting millions of users. I have fixed this but it requires you to get your congressman to fetch it for you and have his staff install it. It's not MY fault if you can't convince your congressman to do this, it's HIS fault, and if you suffer, that's just too bad. Take it up at the voting booth.

explosives?

chemicals my friend

wouldn't take much of the right kind. nice aerosolizer already provided by the craft

biologic if you're exotic

nuclear just plain stupider

but for maximum shits and giggles and no loss of life, i'd load a degaussing coil on a drone and fly it through a target office. do a little tap over all the workstations to get the hard drives

oh shit, am i on some list now?

the topic is

Anonymous Asks Activists To Fight Pedophiles In 'Operation Deatheaters'

do you have anything useful to say on the topic?

that's what i tried to do, and i got many even tempered, thoughtful replies, on topic (except for yours)

http://slashdot.org/comments.p...

but for me to speak on topic, eliciting on topic responses... that's "trolling" according to you

meanwhile, all you seem to do is talk about *me*. why? how is that useful? how is that helpful to the topic? i'm not the topic douchebag

if you desire some sort of interpersonal friction, you might want to try a dating site. otherwise, shut the fuck up, and stay on topic, or you're a useless troll

i've commented on the topic. you've commented on me. who is not contributing substantively here exactly? therefore who is the troll?

and who are you? why would you have a strong opinion about me. do i know you? otherwise, to go after me personally, anonymously, this is what we call a troll

you'd be surprised

there are people who actually believe trading in and looking at child porn isn't a problem, that that is victimless, it's just pictures and video

(it creates demand, of course it's a fucking problem)

watch this thread, you'll see them commenting

yes, that's real

but do you consider that as big a problem as purposefully disenfranchising poor and black people with ridiculous id hurdles, gerrymandering bullshit districts, and rich people and corporations perverting the people's will with legalized corruption?

because random bus people are a grave threat to democracy

unlike gerrymandering, disenfranchisement, plutocratic corruption...

Voter fraud is a nonissue fearmongered and blown out of proportion to enact the real disenfranchisement: Republicans pass laws making voting harder for blacks and the poor.

http://www.theatlantic.com/pol...

It's interesting because it's a last ditch desperate effort to preserve a voting base of old white conservative people which is quite literally dying off.

Then there is the gerrymandering to make sure the Republican voters always dominate in any given Rorschach ink blot of a voting "district."

But after that, Republicans have a real problem keeping and growing a voter base.

Long term, they either die off, or they radically change their ideology.

You have the right to remain stupid.

Nothing new here. Move along please.

It is also nearly impossible for any equipment of any origin to deliver descent content given the crap that is the available content. We have an HD setup, but I do not recall watching any content in HD other than the demos, cos there is nothing we want to watch! We have just cancelled our Sky subscription cos we were not actually watching anything on Sky.

Some people just don't want to watch Hollywood stuff or the Bellisario family products, or sport. It seems there isn't much else, and if there is, its in plain old PAL anyway.