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Comment: I know why I hated it... (Score 1) 350

by Zorkon (#33152742) Attached to: Why Wave Failed

Lack of control over your waves. Yes, it's supposed to be a collaborative environment. But you should still have control over who you collaborate with.

My team and I were using Wave to sketch out ideas for a project that we were working on. One of the team members invited someone else into the Wave - no big deal we thought, we tangentially knew the guy and he could contribute. But then he invited other people to the Wave (despite the warning we placed at the top of the Wave asking folks not to do that).

At that point, we tried to remove all these newcomers and found that we couldn't. We also discovered (well, knew already) that it was impossible to actually delete content from the Wave, because of its versioning capabilities.

So, our semi-private project had become public knowledge, and we had no way to get control back.

I understand that Google eventually did add the ability to manage Wave members ... but there was no way I was going back after what I experienced. A semi-private wiki with access controls is a much better option for my use-case.

Comment: Re:Ignorance (Score 5, Insightful) 490

by Zorkon (#33016956) Attached to: Survey Says Most iPhone Users Love AT&T

Excuse me, but I don't know how else to put this: fuck off.

I love my iPhone, despite it's faults, and I'm a pretty technical person. How technical? I have a degree in physics, have worked with open source and Linux since 1995, was a senior Linux sysadmin for 10 years, and spent a few of the years in between working as an *embedded Linux developer* for mobile projects.

Do I go around telling people that OS X is completely safe and free from viruses and other malware? No. Do I tell them that it's a platform that lets them access the power of Unix without having to fuck around at the command line? Yes.

Same with the phone. Do I say "Hey! This phone was made by Jesus himself and is completely infallible"? Or is it more likely that I say "Hey, it's got its faults - but it's still a great phone ... especially if you're not a Slashdot commenter"?

Enough with the self-righteous anti-fanboy shit. Your generalization of "Apple users" is insulting and wrong.

Comment: Re:I'm Confused... (Score 5, Interesting) 415

by Zorkon (#32993354) Attached to: 'Bloatware' Becoming a Problem On Android Phones

If I could mod this up 10000x, I would.

I love me some open Linux-y goodness, but Android isn't open. Not in the same way the Ubuntu or a desktop OS is. That's not Google's fault, it's the fault of the phone manufacturers. But the end result is the same - if you want full control over your "open" Android phone, you have to circumvent the restrictions the manufacturer has placed on it - *just* like you have to with an iPhone.

So, given that little tidbit, I'd rather get an iPhone. At least Apple has an idea of how to design quality user interfaces. Android suffers from Linux-UI-itis.

(disclaimer: I own both a Nexus One and an iPhone 3GS ... and develop software for both of them. I bought the Nexus One because it was more "open" ... and then discovered that it really wasn't)

Comment: Re:This will only worsen the Android Marketpalce (Score 1) 256

by Zorkon (#32875366) Attached to: The Android Gets Its HyperCard

Agreed. This will not do anything to improve the quality of apps in the Android Marketplace.

I have both a Nexus One and an iPhone. Being an open-source Freedom Is Good kind of guy, I *really* want to love my Nexus One and Android ... but when I go looking for apps, I'm put off by the amount of crap floating around in the Android Marketplace.

Now I'm not saying that the Apple app store doesn't have crap in it, but for some reason a higher percentage of Android apps tend to have crappy UIs, poor features, or both. Take a look at RSS readers for both platforms as an example. The shining pinacle of RSS reading on Android is "NewsRob", which looks like a joke when compared against Reeder or NewsRack on the iPhone.

The ability for the unwashed masses to point and click their way thru app-building? Yeah, that's not gonna work out well for anyone.

Comment: Re:This just proves (Score 1) 706

by Zorkon (#32709638) Attached to: Women Dropping Out of IT

IT at my workplace is unionized ... and it's even worse than the non-unionized IT places I've worked previously. Nothing brings down morale quicker than union Brothers and Sisters bitching about Management on the staff mailing list. Oh, and the union makes it pretty much impossible to fire anyone - meaning that we have some pretty horrible employees working there that wouldn't have stood a chance in any other IT shop that I've ever worked in.

Comment: Re:I hope they win (Score 3, Informative) 263

by Zorkon (#32674612) Attached to: Apple Sues HTC Again Over Patents

Yeah, I gotta agree with this. Of course they're all suing each other - the only people to make money from this are their lawyers and why *wouldn't* they take advantage of the patent system?

Also: Apple didn't "set off a patent Armageddon in the mobile space", as the original poster suggests. Nokia started it in October 2009 - prior to that, Apple was a sleeping patent-giant.

http://www.engadget.com/2009/10/22/nokia-sues-apple-says-iphone-infringes-ten-patents/

Comment: Re:Cry me a river (Score 1, Troll) 562

by Zorkon (#32520134) Attached to: Google Slams Apple Over iPhone Ad Ban

Google started this whole dust-up when they went after Apple. See Gruber's thoughts on the matter:

http://daringfireball.net/linked/2010/06/09/battelle

"There’s no question it’s a dick move on Apple’s part. But what’s the argument against it? That Google gets a pass for being dicks to Apple, and Apple ought to just sit there and take it?"

Comment: Re:Attempted to duplicate - not quite what they sa (Score 1) 264

by Zorkon (#32372358) Attached to: iPhone's PIN-Based Security Transparent To Ubuntu

Besides, don't most people *want* access to their media on the iPhone/iPod? Remember when you could mount old iPods as drives and access the music on them (there was no "security check" there either). Well, this seems to be the same thing, albeit unintentional (or is it?)

Comment: Re:Attempted to duplicate - not quite what they sa (Score 1) 264

by Zorkon (#32372350) Attached to: iPhone's PIN-Based Security Transparent To Ubuntu

Benanov: Read my post more carefully (and the original article) before you tell me to read more carefully.

I did exactly what was described in the security advisory and saw the exact same thing they did. I'm just pointing out that almost no "personal" data was exposed (by "personal", I mean emails, calendar and contact info). Your music & photos are up for grabs, and that's not a good thing. But far less damaging than full access to my email accounts as far as I'm concerned.

Comment: Attempted to duplicate - not quite what they say (Score 4, Informative) 264

by Zorkon (#32367006) Attached to: iPhone's PIN-Based Security Transparent To Ubuntu

I plugged my iPhone 3GS into my Ubuntu box. While it's true that Ubuntu did automount the iPhone, the only thing I can find that was exposed was my music, photos and podcasts.

I wasn't able to access email, contact info, or anything else on the phone. I did see the Application Archives, PublicStaging, Purchases, and Safari folders but they're empty. I have lots of email and contact info on the device - but it appears to be inaccessible via this method.

One good turn asketh another. -- John Heywood

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