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Comment Re:Really? (Score 1) 158

I wouldn't be surprised to see someone like Google saying something like "yawn, 50TB" and saying that they have PETABYTE versions already out there.

Yeah, because at $1MM for 50TB, a $20MM investment by a publicly owned company in such a thing would entirely fly under the radar...

Comment Re:Why stop there? (Score 0) 477

Alternatively, you can presume that, since I am responding to another commenter, I am in fact responding to his claim, rather than hitting reply to the article, and bitching about the issue of not being comped cell phone usage, which is an entirely separate fucking issue.

Or you can choose not to.

Comment Re:Why stop there? (Score 2, Insightful) 477

I know - it's fucking horrible. Like AT&T for example, their interface to do this is a disaster. I have to go to "www.att.com/myWireless", off a button on the front page of AT&T's site, no less, then, get this, they ask for my cell number and a password. Once I enter that in, it's this onerous, convoluted situation where I am forced to let my eyes wander roughly four inches from the top of the page to this tiny graphic that occupies, hmmm, no more than a third of the page width, and has all this legalistic jargon like:

As of October 13, 2010, you have 3 days left in your billing cycle.

And then, under the graphic that purports to show the same data, it tries to bamboozle you with phrases like:

Anytime Minutes: 253 of 550 used.

and

Rollover Minutes: 0 of 2325 used.

This is the kind of shit we shouldn't stand for.

Comment Re:Or... (Score 1) 477

I recently added a global data plan (at a rate of about $1 per day over my regular data plan) for an overseas trip and was shocked to see a $130 data charge that didn't show up until a couple of weeks after the trip.

Maybe you should read more carefully. On all the carriers I've activated global roaming (T-Mobile, AT&T, Verizon - I can't imagine Sprint being different), when activating, you are expressly advised that billing reconciliation with international providers may take several weeks and "charges may not be reflected until a later bill".

Comment Re:Wow, just... wow (Score 1) 475

The parent sued and got a small part of the settlement as part of a suit or the parents didn't sue and got nothing. Unless you have a lawyer, you're not getting anywhere.

Yeah, I think that's part of people's problem. "You got nothin'. We'll do it for you - what with our monopoly on such things - but we're taking the vast majority of the win. Don't like it? Well, you're just shit outta luck, huh?"

On average, lawyers make between 50-100K

Ehhh, not really. In 2006, the middle 50% of lawyers made between $82,000 and $168,000.

The clients themselves can dispute the costs if they wish. Again, the lawyers have to detail their bills.

That's great. And if they say "Phone calls: $2/min in telephony charges, plus standard rate for attorney, plus $30/hr for dictation", the issue isn't in the itemization.

Comment Re:Wow, just... wow (Score 1) 475

This would be a serious ethical breach opening the door to a legal malpractice suit, disciplinary action, and potentially disbarment for the attorney.

It would be a serious ethical breach. It's also a highly subjective area, and lawyers and bar associations are notoriously difficult to persuade to sanction a lawyer, possibly from fear that they, one day, might be subject to sanctions for such a claim.

Legal malpractice is no joke. About the same amount is paid out in legal malpractice each year as medical malpractice.

Great soundbite. Then you realize that while there are 700,000 physicians in the US (not all practicing), there are 1.7 million active lawyers.

Comment Re:Wow, just... wow (Score 1) 475

Cases like this are risky endeavors for lawyers. Clients don't have many choices in this kind of case because they are very difficult if not impossible to win. The lawyer and the client, before the case was even filed, assigned value to the risk in a mutually agreed to contract.

Wronged person has no opportunity for recourse other than to utilize services of lawyer at essentially any rate lawyer chooses, because some recourse is better than none. Other than choosing no recourse for a wrong (how about that, a society where justice has a price you have to be able to pay), that sounds almost suspiciously close to "duress", what with a legal monopoly on being admitted to the bar (you cannot represent 'yourself' in a class action).

Now that the risk has been played out and the plaintiff has won, the outcome looks unfair. Before the case, only a crazy person would take the case, even with the huge payout potential. After the case, that crazy person that went all-or-nothing when no one else would is lambasted by a bunch of uninvolved bystanders for being greedy.

Alternatives: crazy person actually is not all that crazy at all, and had a reasonable belief and expectation that there was a significant likelihood of success, however much lawyers like to pull out the "risky endeavour, very difficult if not impossible to win" card.

Or crazy person is entirely crazy, in which case is of suspect judgment. If you jump from a plane without a parachute, you're crazy. You don't become less crazy because you survived, to use your attempt at an analogy.

Comment Re:It's not "the" guide (Score 1) 453

reestablished my open SSH sessions to my Linux box

Strange ... there I was thinking of that little KeyRegenerationInterval parameter - and just how an SSH connection would be re-established following a key mismatch. That is, of course, following the whole issue of the ClientAliveInterval, by default 5 minutes - no response received, connection dropped. Methinks your mind might be deceiving you ...

Comment Re:It's not "the" guide (Score 1) 453

FWIW, the majority of PC laptops (with the exception of high-end and gaming laptops) have integrated Intel GFX hardware.

Hmm? As soon as you hit the heady heights of the ~$450 range, Dell laptops (for one) are offering ATI Mobility Radeon as their standard video card option...

Comment Re:Imagine if you had to Hack Windows to run on a (Score 1) 453

Then you don't know anything about Amiga OS.

Workbench ROMs, all of which were copyright owned by Commodore and normally only sold with a complete system

Speaking of not knowing anything about Amiga. There was a huge market for Kickstart (the firmware, Workbench was the software) 2.0 ROMs and most people didn't buy a new system to upgrade.

Comment Re:People are getting dumber and dumber (Score 1) 454

Store policy on pre-optimized units (be they laptops, game consoles, etc.) is that if the sales person cannot "sell" the service to the customer, and the last units are all pre-setup, the customer does not pay for a service that they do not want.

Store policy may well be that. Reality, however, is not. As I've experienced on two separate occasions. "Sorry, we cannot provide the service for free, and it has already been performed."

Often times a customer will gladly pay the 40 bucks for a laptop with no trial software, a full battery charge and all updates

"No trial software" - I saw this once. They'd deleted the icons from the desktop. Not even from the start menu. "A full battery charge" - with LiIon/LiPolymer batteries, the last four laptops I've taken from their boxes had 99%+ battery charge on first plug in. "All updates" - potentially valid, but it's not like manufacturers don't slipstream.

a simple call to the corporate number would fix that issue if it ever occurred to you

I'm not the Best Buy Sales Policeman. Instead I'll go home, and buy it online, and Best Buy will get none of that sale.

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