(That's what I meant by "overlaid") - but yeah that's exactly right, and that's why you'll sometimes see the last 2 seconds of another commercial - it's because the clock is off on your local cable provider's hardware.

Yes, but the commercials you see are a combination of the national commercials and commercials that are overlaid by your cable provider.

This is entirely anecdotal, but nearly all of the gun owners I know care very deeply about issues like the NSA surveillance and the TSA, and often contribute to groups that help fight against that kind of thing (like EFF).

Can you share any sources on this? I'm not saying you're wrong, but I have seen in other comments that violent home invasions have gone UP since this happened, and nobody's provided any source material to verify.

> To a European, used to being able to walk down the street without being threatened by guns

Serious question - do your gun laws actually prevent criminals from having guns? In the states, I don't think they do (see Chicago, LA, New York for examples).

That's the best thing about Android. I often wish that iOS had widgets, instead of relegating them to the notification center and limiting to what Apple provides. I also really wish Apple would have a "what is using my battery" screen like Android does.

That's true. Aside from the fact that I'm astonished that people - mainly Android fanboys - still judge me based on the kind of phone I use (iPhone 4S) - seriously, why do you care? - I'm constantly asked about specs. And your comment hits the nail on the head, comparing specs is not really a useful metric.

My 2+-year-old iPhone, with an 800MHz CPU and 512MB of RAM still performs better than a lot of current Android devices on the market. Granted, certain things - like 3D gaming performance - are probably lacking these days, but the day-to-day stuff performs noticeably smoother.

I'm pretty sure I know the answer to this... but am I the only one here who actually likes having a small phone? I guess it's a trade-off. I'm willing to give up the convenience of having the extra screen real estate for having a small phone...

That seems like a better analogy. Either way, the general public definitely stops taking alerts seriously when they get too many of them.

It often is a common feed. This is how the emergency alert system works, at least as I understand it - but note that I am no expert. I'll use an example of a weather alert.

Weather warning is issued by the National Weather Service. The alert goes out (with the EAS tones, which actually contain modulated data containing information about the type of alert, the geographical area, timing, etc.) via NOAA Weather Radio.

Your local radio station(s), TV station(s), and cable provider(s) have a device, such as a Sage EAS ENDEC, which is tuned to the weather radio station. When an alert goes out, if it's on the list of "important" alerts, this device will preempt programming - the broadcaster usually has no direct control over it - automatically to get the alert out there.

This is probably why you heard all of them at the same time.

There is also a situation where some broadcasters listen to other broadcasters. For example, in my area, we have a 50,000 watt AM station (it actually covers something like 37 states on good days). When a tornado warning is issued, first it's the weather radio, then it's said AM station, and then everyone else, because everyone else gets it from the AM station.

There's much more to it than that, but that's how I understand it. Hope that helps.

That's absolutely correct. However, with a NOAA weather radio, there's a good chance that you'll get even longer lead time.

For example, the tornado warning for Joplin was issued 17 minutes before that tornado touched the ground (source).

Obviously it's not practical to have a weather radio everywhere, and I'm certainly not going to carry one with me when I'm out and about...

But I will say this: I have seen these things be early and late. Fortunately I have other methods of getting severe weather warnings on my phone, which tend to be more reliably on time.

Yup. It becomes a cry wolf/alarm fatigue situation when they abuse it.

Go into Settings -> Notifications and scroll all the way to the bottom, there are two switches there. If you don't have them, then probably your carrier doesn't support it yet.

I believe it depends on both the carrier and the device. I know AT&T and Verizon have implemented this in many areas. On the iPhone, I believe iOS 6.x and above supports it, but it needs to be enabled on the device by the carrier. I just had the options appear on my phone after a carrier file update a few weeks ago.