Which is one of the many problems with legislation against technological innovation. There are ample examples of the US government doing things, like monitoring, to individuals that they legally can not do. But to protest that you are being monitored, you must first be aware that you are being monitored and at that time you can go to a judge, which is your write, and force the monitoring entity to justify their action or stop.

The problem is that no one tells you when you get a strike and when you are being monitored.

In fact government entities will often tell the ISP that it is against federal law to inform you that you are being monitored. Good luck finding out so you can assert your birth rights.

Its broken and broken bad. I can not think of a single instance where censorship is working effectively.

Look at Youtube, someone puts in a DCMA complaint against you, your content is taken out. The person who theoretically was offended is given adsense (a monetary value, rewarded) for lying. You spend 10 plus days fighting it, even though it should never have happened in the first place. Even if put back up, your momentum is stymied and the chance to get your content to more people is effectively prevented. After the fact, Google never goes back and penalizes the person/entity that censored you. They do not even put in place measures to prevent it from happening to you again, and again, and again.

This six strikes BS will not be any different.

As a friend of mine says, and we should all repeat as the reality of this thought is so obvious. "It is insane to assume that one every street, in every neighborhood, of every city block in every community, in every city, in every county there are torrent users stealing content. Yet the ISP, unless you have Fiber To The Home (FTTH) and a plan guaranteeing you the same bandwidth upstream as downstream...10Mb/10Mb; 50Mb/50Mb... 1Gb/1Gb, throttles every house on every street to below the FTC definition of broadband (768Kbps) 100% of the time.

Especially Cable providers. If you get a DD-WRT firmware installed firewall/router, you will see your upstream / downstream bandwidth in real time. You will NEVER see upstream bandwidth throughputs above 768Kbps, except during the Speed Test. Cable plans that provide 16Mb/2Mb normally throttle to less than DSL speeds(100Kbps/10Kbps or 200Kbps/20Kbps), in fact in most cases to less than 1/4 of DSL Speeds, especially upstream. Which means DSL is not only cheaper but faster, provides more bandwidth upstream than throttled cable service.

Even when I manage to get 10Mb downstream, my upstream is throttled to below 120Kbps. How is this not FRAUD? If 768Kbps is the minimum definition for BROADBAND, than upstream speeds below that level can NOT be considered BROADBAND.

And the reason for their throttling, those evil bit torrents that they lie and say are ONLY used to steal content. I bet not a single neighbor on my street has ever used a bittorrent...so why is my service throttled 24 hours a day, 7 days a week to less than BROADBAND speeds?

You will never see it answered anywhere because its a lie. It is not true. And they know it.

Shame you posted as Anonymous...your are very much right on the money. Whenever a company gets in bed with either Microsoft or Apple, they are usually gone within 4 years, many in less than two years. Corel might be one exception, though the numbers of their users has steadily declined over the years, despite investing in the best products for some verticals...WordPerfect is a perfect example as it was the best Word Processor. PaintShop Pro is another casualty of their requirement that you purchase the latest / greatest operating system before it will let you install. (Though friend of mine did successfully use another friends copy of Vista, Install PSP 10 to USB and run it under Windows 2000 and XP successfully years ago...though he said that it took some tweeking)

Can anyone say Linspire? How about Lotus 1-2-3? Just look at Nokia, of course in that scenario they mistakenly brought in a MS trojan horse that continues to push them toward Windows Smart phones despite it being obvious to everyone that other operating systems (esp Linux) are much more efficient for embedded devices (smaller computers, smart phones) as they require less memory, freeing up memory for the apps.

So many examples. So we should not be surprised that having been unable to beat alternative tablets that do more and cost less money, that they pursue litigation (the court system) to forestall innovation in alternative (non-Apple) platforms.

Microsoft even announced yet another vaporware product in hopes of forestalling innovation in alternative (non-Windows) platforms. If you are just now seeing a pattern, congrats, many of us have seen this for well over 20 years...not new.

My next smart embedded device will be running a Linux distro, fully rootable (meaning I can install whatever I want) and will not limit me for wrong (proprietary) reasons.

Just do your homework and purchase ONLY from a Linux vendor in order to avoid proprietary chipsets that are designed to simply vendor lock you in to their platform (and every higher forced fees and purchases). Two excellent Linux vendors are ZaReason and System 76. There are many others. The cost + shipping usually gives you more (memory, hard disk, processor) for less than most, if not all, big box stores. Best of all, if you want to install the proprietary operating system on a Linux device, usually you can, the converse is sometimes not true.

Buy with Linux in mind, even if you plan to run Windows or OS X, when the company stops supporting the software, your device will still run one of more than two dozen Linux distros (operating systems) and that is a very good thing.

I want to code using standalone PHP and the new HTML5 standards that will let your apps continue to function when the device (smart embedded device) is NOT connected to the Internet. Others want to use Python or Ruby.

If the device is open and unlocked with Administrator (Root) access than you and I both can use it as we see fit....which is the most basic definition of whether a device is truly smart.

I would add, as a friend of mine likes to say, that if the device is beyond the first release, than it should only run more software on it than the previous release, never less. If the new device runs fewer applications than the last device, its just not smart.

Finally I want VoIP WiFi access which can NOT be denied to me if I have Root / Admin Access. As WiFi is available to me in over 80% of the places where I spend my life. The only place its not, is when I am in transit between places and most state laws are forcing hands free or outright bans when in transit anyway.

I want to use social media, chats, blogs, tweets, facebook, etc... without the need of any additional monthly fee, Wifi access guarantees all of us these options...thus I am ever hopeful.

You are right on the money, loved your post~

Apple is far from the only company doing this. I long ago realized that if I developed apps that depended on any proprietary hardware/software platform that as soon as I became profitable enough that proprietary company would take my vertical away from me...they simply would always have more money to spend, some of that raised by me on their behalf for using their closed system. That does not seem smart.

Worst of all, when it is not possible to innovate any longer, the proprietary company will put me/you out of business via a forced update / upgrade. As I would be dependent on them and they could care less about me. This is the problem with supporting any proprietary infrastructure, what happens when the company decides screw you, you are going to do it my (proprietary company) way and pay them more as a thank you for destroying your business. Added bonus if they force you out of the market through patent/copyright litigation...pathetic.

The best thing any of us can do is to simply stop purchasing their products. Give em the death penalty (since Citizens United made them people).

It should always be the owner/users choice to update and/or upgrade. If a company "forces" you to update or upgrade and does not allow you to say H E double Hockey Sticks NO, than you are one forced update/upgrade from an expensive paper weight. Of course your work flow will be interrupted at the absolutely worst possible time in your life...way too much business risk. Yet companies assume that every day with so many products these days. Its simply a sign of how far Data Processing / Information Technology has fallen as a profession.

Of course weak tarriff / trade / international economic policy has been slowly destroying the fabric of the USA for well over 50 years. To connect the dots...jobs offshoring, jobs going overseas, job losses, wages driven below the basement and into the sewer.

Of course I am not saying auto update and auto upgrade is destroying the American family...a bit of a stretch... though I would say that taxes have never been lower and the promised jobs for those lower taxes have never materialized.

I guess what I am saying is that forced policies, taking away freedom, regardless of the miss guided reasons is just wrong. I might not agree with your statement, but I defend with my life, based on the US Constitution, Its Admendments and the Bill of Rights which are given to each of us by birth in America, your right to say it...if you do not do likewise....your loss. Guess its easier to attack the man and tell him he needs Anger Management. Of course you would probably say I need Anger Management classes too...talk about reaching...pathetic.

In America today, there is very little NEW either economically or control-wise (church/state) under the sun. If you are willing to give up a smidgen of freedom for any reason, especially fake security, you honestly do deserve neither. A very smart man said that hundreds of years ago.

For those that can not see the connection between freedom and required/force updates and current economic, business and political policies over the last 100 years...well that is the reason you mistakenly vote against your own best interests...wake up. There is so much more to life than talking points...which most often are designed to prevent you from connecting the dots and realizing what is being done to you, behind your back, out of the sunlight.

Updates, upgrades SHALL always be the owner/users choice. If that choice is taken away, don't hate the entity, just stop doing any business with them. And share your experience with family, friends, co-workers, strangers so that others will do likewise. I agree with other posters, Apples actions here is costing them current Apple enthusiasts. Those that have left Apple are laughing all the way to the bank, where they notice their balance is larger for being smart enough to purchase better technology (non Apple), that can do more, for less money.

The joke is on Apple.

Sounds like you are saying wireless can not provide the bandwidth...which I totally agree with,

... however than you say wireless is the way to go or at least it seemed to me. I must disagree with that...which is it?.

Not that it matters as anything other than Fiber To The Home (FTTH) is a ponzi scheme, false promises, waste of time and money. Only FTTH offers us a viable future! Why should Americans continue to settle for less? Japan had 100Mb/100Mb in 2000 and 1Gb/1Gb in 2006, its 2011...hello, 768Kbps is broadband, really? NOT!

The current NON-synchronous Internet providers are NOT providing you the bandwidth you are paying for? Instead of “up to” some lie, how about a money back guarantee if your upstream bandwidth falls below the FCC definition? Even that is over 11 years out of date and way too slow. There is no way in heck they are going to provide more bandwidth via wireless, it does not matter how many Gs they promise you. Everyone knows that wired infrastructure, specifically Fiber To The Home (FTTH) is far, far superior to wireless 3G, 4G, 10G anything.

I bet I can serve more clients on a wired synchronous FTTH home network with a DD-WRT, OpenWRT or tomato firmware enabled firewall/router than the cellular company can serve via any level of G wireless...but that is not the point, even if it is not entirely accurate. At least I would know with 100% certainty exactly what my broadband bandwidth really is 24X7X365 thanks to the bandwidth monitors in those firmwares! Speed Tests lie!

Any technology other than Fiber all the way into the Home (FTTH) (not GPON, FTTC, DOCSIS, 3G, 4G,...10G, etc...) is simply a waste of time and a very poor attempt by your provider to extend the bandwidth scarcity myth. They use lies, like bandwidth scarcity to extort higher and higher monthly fees from you (going up yearly) forever. Or until you can no longer afford it and they dump you.

If any market was honestly FREE, prices would fluctuate both up and down, unless of course the market is NOT FREE or the provider is severely incompetent. I know what I believe and somewhat know to be true....WAKE UP.

Back in 2006, people way smarter than you and I managed to take a single strand of Fiber and multiplex it (increase the bandwidth) from 1X bandwidth to 1024X bandwidth. This was over 4 years ago. So to say we do NOT have the technology to provide it is not accurate either. Virtually unlimited bandwidth if you are smart and run Fiber, un-interrupted by inferior technologies, all the way into the subscribers home. Not just to their neighborhood.

As for not being feasible, tell the over 20 communities with synchronous FTTH listed on this map...they all did it, therefore your hypothesis is very, very wrong. It most certainly can be done. It has been done. Hopefully you are not a shill for the industry, but if you are, be aware that many of us are awake. Many of us see these companies for what they are, even more Americans are waking up thanks to the blatant acts of various politicians. We are aware of the broken promises over the last 20+ years.

Consider this:

Note: The telcos have been lobbying our local, state and national politicians for well over 20 years, not just 5 years. So these numbers are conservative. Its a shame they chose the wrong path, rather than the right path...putting their customers first!

Where's the Fiber?

Where's the Synchronous Fiber?

The incumbent providers (Telco and CableCos) have violated their customer's TRUST. They have violated our TRUST! Why in the heck would we care about them any more? Why not pay them back in the best way possible – churn or move to a location were we no longer have to use their services. To a community that cares about the people living there enough to elect politicians that will put them first and not cater to industry lobbyists.

Use the Map, verify that the community has Synchronous FTTH, the same upstream as downstream, as such a provider has no incentive to throttle a customer's bandwidth to below what they are promised. Be it 10Mb, 15Mb, 30Mb, 50Mb, 100Mb or 1000Mb upstream, they can give that entire pipe to that one customer because FTTH is the ONLY technology that is not limited by design unless the provider is incompetent, lazy, cheap or just outright evil. NO more “up to” BS lies. Should a provider be able to label their service as Broadband if their upstream or downstream bandwidth falls below the FCC definition of 768Kbps? I think NOT! You should not accept that either!

First of all to become one of the Google's Think Big With a Gig communities, most if not all of the red tape issues needed to be already taken care just to be considered for selection. Definitely a commitment by those lucky enough to be selected to move forward.

LMAO I would love to hear any politician tell their citizen's that the reason they did not succeed in becoming one of the first 5 Google's Think Big With a Gig Community was because the telco or cable company paid me to sabotage the process.

Are your community's politicians bought and paid for by your local telco-cable-cellular oligopoly? How would you know?

Think about that real hard because if your community can not get Fiber To The Home (FTTH). Perhaps your politicians are corrupt and not putting you, your family, your friends, your neighbors FIRST as they should.

If the local incumbent provider can lobby your politicians and prevent your family from getting FTTH, than so can other mega-corporations.

Given the Citizens United vs FEC decision you will never be allowed to hear the truth, only the negative campaign ads against any honest citizen politician! You should solve that in the next election for the sake of your family, friends and neighbors.

EPB in Chattanooga finished their FTTH, Fiber To The Home, build-out years ahead of schedule. The first build-out took a total of only 3 years...so getting another community done in two years with Google's backing is most definitely possible. Even easier when you consider the preparation a community has to go through just to be considered for the Fiber. In Chattanooga, with a minimal influx of additional cash (a $112M federal grant) they were able to finish ahead of schedule. Chattanooga now serves 20,000 residential customers and 2,500 business customers.

I think everyone reading this would agree that Google can pump way more than $112M, $300M or even $600M into any FTTH community it decides too. So what's your point!

More important will be the prices. Check out prices for Synchronous FTTH with EPB of Chattanooga:

And here are prices per cbemerine comment in The Real Reason to Cut the Cable? :

While I might wait through the end of this year to figure out where Google is going to go, there is no reason to wait until 2012, 2015 or 2020 and beyond. All of us can move today, this this map shows Synchronous FTTH US communities, there are almost 30 communities I can move to, today. None of us have to wait on anyone, not even Google.

I feel the same way, now that Fedora has announced that they too will support Wayland, both Ubuntu and Fedora are off my list.

Microsoft has hurt Linux in the past by leading people down proprietary and technological blind alleys. While I have no ill will toward Wayland, I do not want to look up one day and find out that something has been automated against my wishes or that I no longer have 100% control over my PC hardware.

Wayland ~ Mono ~ .Net (dotNet) ~ Microsoft.

All Microsoft has to do is make a change to .Net that impacts Linux in a negative way and it will be pulled upstream into Mono and upstream into Wayland.

Anyone who says this will never happen has a short memory, practicing revisionist history or has not been in the field very long. The rest of us have seen this before...can you say Embrace, Extend and Extinguish, I knew you could.

To avoid Wayland is simple, pay attention to which distros are implementing Mono and/or Wayland by default and avoid them. Use this graphic - GNU/Linux distro timeline to make sure your distro is not impacted by those distros that are implementing Mono in their food chain!

Thankfully with Linux we have allot of other choices and this is a very good thing.

You are so right on the money!

How many times do you have to get burned and led down a proprietary blind alley before you learn to never take a step down that road as it NEVER ends well for you, your PC, open source and Linux...NEVER.

You are right on about Mark Shuttleworth's goals, of course its his money and he can play the cards as he sees fit, of course we do not have to sit at his table do we.

As for Fedora, watch out, they are have announced that they are going to Wayland eventually as well. Wayland ~ Mono ~ .NET is a little too much for me as well. It will be interesting to see what they come up with.

Here is a great Graphics view of different Distros and which are derived from which base distros. Obviously to avoid Wayland you want to avoid any distro that gets its base from either Ubuntu or Fedora.

They can not release any personal information that you DO NOT PROVIDE to them.

I too hate this crap, but too many people do not take privacy seriously and provided the information in the past, therefore, they (companies) have no reason not to expect you to follow and give them information like you have in the past. They believe we are all sheeple!

Too many social networking sites want to lock you into bad OAuth sites, like Facebook, LinkedIn, etc. Too many people forget that as soon as they have any piece of information related to you and a single phone call, monthly bill, purchase, email account, etc, they know exactly who you are.

Are you willing to stop using a site that violates your privacy? Most are not, therefore giving a nod to the company that wants to violate our privacy.

Security and privacy go hand in hand. Privacy requires you to maintain a singular mind set to maintain your privacy and not get lazy. If you give up and provide the information because someone says you should not have anything to hide, its game over from a privacy perspective. Once you slip up and give out any private information, its just one small step from putting the pieces together and identifying who you are, what you are looking at in order to market to you. Of course who besides marketers are using this info for what other purposes will never be fully disclosed to you, ever.

Our Credit information, another privacy sink, which contains all our personal information is too tightly inter-twined with our lives now, as if your credit determines what type of driver you are and should relate in any way to increasing the amount you pay for insurance. Pathetic.

Is your browser secure? Can you tightly control not just regular cookies but Flash cookies as well? With Firefox + Linux (Banish Flash cookies forever under Linux) you can. Chrome is in bed with Adobe and Flash so they will never provide a viable option to delete tracking cookies. Internet Explorer was never meant to keep information about you private, ever. What other browsers let you delete Flash cookies on a regular basis? Even with Firefox, a reboot of my PC is required to delete the stupid Flash tracking cookies, but at least I can do that with Linux!

In all cases, a company can not reveal what you do not provide to them. Do they really need your phone number? Really, REALLY, grow a pair and say NO! Where else might you get the info, there are always other options. Do they really need your email account info? Do they really need a credit card? There are always other options, granted some might not be as convenient, but they are out there if you are willing to expend the energy to seek them out.

If you are not willing to spend some time to protect your privacy, than you are probably not reading this right now.

While all sites should OPT OUT by DEFAULT, we know they do not and we know why. Of course you do not have to use that site! You have choices. If you only have two choices, you have no real choice. Sometimes you just have to say NO! Sometimes, as in this case, you have to say H8ll NO!

And I would be happy for you, just do not REQUIRE me to do likewise and we are golden.

Don't force me to give my phone number to use your service.

Don't limit my OAuth options in responding to a blog. ONLY if I use Disqus, Facebook, Twitter or LinkedIn

Don't force me to do anything I do not want to do, or I will choose not to participate...I will vote with my dollars and you will not see even one of them.

What a tool comment. If you want to give me better filters fine, but not allowing me any level of fine control is unacceptable, I will stop using your product offering. Such is the case with privacy, cookies, Flash and Chrome/Internet Explorer compared to Firefox + Linux. (With Linux I can redirect the flash crap to /tmp and let it get erased between sessions, while unacceptable at least can be accomplished. Thankfully Flash is dying a slow death, it can not happen soon enough...that's what they get for attempting to take away my choice.)

If you have only two choices, you have no choice.

Amazing and how sad for you. I would accept a simpleton version for someone that does not want control or access to filter to their own specifications, but you had better allow for more intelligent options for an advanced user. If not you better allow for root/admin access so I can correct your mistake or I will not use your product. To simply take it away and justify it with such an inane comment that I am somehow better off is silly. Its also extremely short sighted.

No Root access = Stupid Device = Not Smart. (Good mantra for cell phone makers)

If you are a developer and too lazy to give me options, at least give me the mechanism to fix it, or I will not purchase your product and/or user your service. You fail.

Please tell me you are not an American. As you are simply way to quick to give up the freedoms that our your birthright.

Censorship is never the answer.

You do not get more freedom by giving up freedoms. Your life does not get better when you give away your liberty or any freedoms. Once you start down that path, you will quickly reach a level that is simply unacceptable, the wise never allow themselves to be pushed down the path...ever. Not one step. You want to make my life better, give me valid options and choice.

When interviewed after Nazi Germany fell, those that went along with the status quo simply stated that the last time they took away our freedoms was not so bad, so this time will not be so bad either.

This happened once, than twice, than three times, yet another and another, until finally the path from the First time (A) to the last time (Z) was neither acceptable nor clear. By the time they got to G, it was too late and too much had been given away for nothing in return.

The powers that be understand this better than you do, as going from Step A to Step G would be unacceptable, however if they can get you to accept step B; than from Step B accept step C and so on, before you know it you are at Step G, deer in the headlights stupidity for allowing yourself to be led to the slaughter. Pathetic and easily avoidable by never allowing yourself to be pushed to step B.

Try innovation and making the product better for both the simple users and the more advance users.

Better to choose not to play than to allow your life to be controlled and prevented from becoming all that you can become.

Benjamin Franklin was right..."They who can give up essential liberty to obtain a little temporary safety, deserve neither liberty nor safety."

Facebook's privacy antics are certainly limiting its usefulness for anyone with a reasoned mind. Are you honestly missing the comparison to AOL....

Speak for yourself, but not for me or mine...

I would see your security hole and raise you two or three more for a variety of MS Products. You would always lose.

Next time someone says something you use has a security hole, check and see if it states that "local access" is required for the exploit. If so, what are you getting excited about...you giving black hatters the keys to your home/apartment/business? I certainly hope not.

There will always be security holes. Fools automatically update to supposedly avoid them. Intelligent IT professionals look into the nature of the security holes and determine if they are viable in their environment or not before upgrading. Its the way it always has been, is and always will be.

Only those that are unable to understand what the security issues are, automatically (read blindly) update without understanding what the real issues are and if they even apply or not.

More often than not, more problems are introduced than are fixed.

More importantly true experts do not settle for security by obscurity, if given the choice. Whether they have the choice or not is usually the telling part of whether someone is respected by their chain of command or not.

Blindly upgrading, updating, auto-updating is insane . . . and a sign of desperation, to be avoided at all costs.

Anyone who suggests, believes or tries to state the above is not true, needs to research the facts as many of us have...they are out there if you care to look for them. I understand that some do not.

Pretty much sums it up and hits the nail on the head for my friends and I.

I have yet to see a single company that has done business with Microsoft, except perhaps a couple of hardware manufacturers (but even they are unhappy and complain from time to time) that are still viable businesses after 2, 3 or 4 years.

Instead of buying the marketing hype, there are a number of us that refuse to purchase anything from Microsoft until they have, by their actions, not miss-behaved towards open source, FOSS, Linux for a minimum of 7 years. If after a 7 year positive track record they have stopped the FUD, ceased their Embrace, Extend, Extinguish business practices than and only than will we once again consider their products. Any of their products.

Any company that treats open source, FOSS, Linux poorly gets a clock set. For first time offenders, a 3 Year Clock is sufficient, however for a company like Microsoft that has continued their awful business practices against open source, FOSS, Linux, etc... for more than 15 years, well 3 years is simply not sufficient, thus a 7 YEAR CLOCK is more appropriate.

They can lie, deceive, etc...with marketing and words, but they can not hide their actions. And they do try to hide them, don't they, but eventually it all comes out into the light of day. Yes, it always comes out eventually. When you become aware of it, right there and then, re-set your 7 YEAR CLOCK! Its long past time for them to walk the walk. I just do not see it happening.

Each time they act badly, I reset my 7 year clock. It is that simple.

For those that think 7 years is too harsh, sorry your wrong. Microsoft specifically, has been at this for over two decades and many of us KNOW IT!

They say they care about TRUST, but they do not. They prove it by their very ACTIONS. At the end of the day, their words mean nothing. Well they lost allot of our TRUST over the years...shock us and actually try to earn it back. I dare you.

Trust, it was theirs to lose and lose they did.

I challenge all supporters of Open Source, FOSS, to join us in our 7 YEAR CLOCK.

Consider this, if a company knew that a large block of developers, those of us that live on the bleeding edge, would boycott their products for a period of 3 years at the slightest transgression, do you think they would dare, of course not. They can only continue such negative practices if you let them...if you continue to purchase their products. You are basically saying, yea we know you are giving us one up the back side, but we don't care, we will keep taking it.

I do not think so! Enough is enough.

I was wondering how large USB devices had become just last night, wow. Christmas 2008, you could purchase either a 16GB or 32GB for around $15 on sale.

My last 4GB Micro SD Kingston was FREE after the rebate came back to me. I think I paid $5 for it at the time...bought the limit. A month later they were priced back at $10 to $15 dollars.

But $799, that is a bit steep for me. My last 500GB drive cost less than $80. I think you can get 1 TB for that today.