Is there an alternative that better lends itself to automation? From what I have seen, Roku has the best automation by far, with a rich REST API that allows querying the apps installed, querying the app currently running, retrieving app icons for use in third-party apps, and sending any remote-control or keyboard command over IP

Apple TV and Android TV don't even publish their remote-control-over-IP API.

Once you are in a Roku app, it's less clear what you might could do other than the remote-control commands, but this is more the fault of the app-providers rather than Roku.

My biggest gripe with Roku right now is that they are the ONLY platform to not include Dolby Vision support, even on their most recently released Ultra in October. DV is a must to me for any movie streaming. Watching the same content with HDR10 is a fairly big step down. Otherwise I'd probably be using a Roku instead of an Apple TV 4K for most of my content, especially now that iTunes content is available on the Roku.

It depends on the plan and the service, but yes, under a high-deductible health plan (HDHP), I see both the rate the provider billed at as well as the (drastically less) negotiated rate. I pay 100% of the negotiated rate for my plan (before deductible is met), a percentage of the negotiated rate (after the deductible is met, but before the out-of-pocket is met), and 0% after the out-of-pocket is met.

What I can't see, at least not until this regulation goes into effect, is the negotiated rate for a particular provider before I make a decision on where to have the procedure done.

That's a good point -- This regulation will help expose the "out-of-network" bad actor problem, but not fix it.

In my experience, it's the anesthesiologists that are the biggest offender here. You don't get to choose your anesthesiologist for a procedure, and you might randomly get one assigned on the day-of-your-procedure that is covered by your plan or (much more often) one that is not, potentially leaving you on the hook for thousands for their full-price.

Perhaps I'm misunderstanding your point, but isn't that what the second regulation would handle? Insurers (who negotiate the rates with the providers) would be required to show the negotiated rates as well. Both "list" prices (from the hospitals) and "discounted" prices (from the insurers) would be available to the consumer, right?

Or are you saying that the rates the insurers pay are different than the rates the insured pay? For most plans, I don't think that's the case. Typically, before the deductible/out-of-pocket is met, the insured pays the rate (or a percentage of it) that their insurance plan has negotiated with the provider. The amount the provider receives doesn't change after the deductible or out-of-pocket is met, it just shifts (either as a percentage or a whole) from the insured to the insurer.

10 years ago, non-competes were invalid under Georgia law. Then we had a referendum on a ballot to put them in. You'd think that normal people would vote against this, right? But here's how it was worded (from ballotpedia.org) on the November 2, 2010 ballot:

Shall the Constitution of Georgia be amended so as to make Georgia more economically competitive by authorizing legislation to uphold reasonable competitive agreements?

And 68% of the idiot voters fell for it.

Perhaps that's a little unfair to the voters. The wording was clearly insanely misleading; to the point where if I were challenging a non-compete in court, I'd probably start with attacking the validity of the ballot referendum as fraudulent (probably a hopeless avenue, I know).

Your "ire" is a bit misplaced. Actually, PWAs are endorsed and will be supported by every major browser vendor other than Apple. They've been covered here on Slashdot multiple times over the last few years. One of those articles mentioned that Google has deprecated the Chrome App Store because they also believe PWAs are the right way to deliver Web apps to the desktop.

Apologies in advance, I'm going to try to say this nicely, but have you been living under a rock (or not upgraded your browser) for the last 3 years? The W3C Push API and WHATWG Notifications API have been around for at least that long. And I would be really surprised if you haven't seen a website ask permission to send notifications.

A quick search shows that Chrome implemented the ability for a website to send notifications even after the tab is closed almost 3 years ago in Chrome 42. I'd be really surprised if Edge didn't implement this capability for PWAs and already support the ability for the user to disable them on a site-by-site basis.

I'm looking forward to PWAs, personally. At the moment, there are pretty much no Google apps (Gmail, etc.) in the Microsoft App Store. This will change that. Besides Google, I'd expect most top-tier web applications will also release as a PWA.

Sure, there will be plenty of junk apps, but how is that different than any app store (iOS, Android, etc.) today? You have to wade through a lot of junk on any platform, but that doesn't mean the concept isn't useful. Having these in the Windows Store at least allows user ratings to help filter out the bad ones.

My first question would be whether the Georgia Power substation was using Triconex Safety Instrumented System (SIS) controllers.

See this post last week by FireEye, where an attack was made in a similar scenario.

From the post, "We have not attributed the incident to a threat actor, though we believe the activity is consistent with a nation state preparing for an attack."

- Phone is sitting on my desk.
- Phone is on a mount in my car
- Phone is being used for Apple Pay

In all of those situations, my finger is a far quicker method to unlock the phone.

In the case of a car, it's even a safety issue, in my opinion.

Me: "Hey Siri, Open Waze"
SirI: "You'll need to unlock your phone first."

Now: Reach up and touch the home button with my finger, then use Waze voice control.
Then: Take the phone off the mount and point it at my face (while driving), both taking my hand off the wheel for longer and obstructing my view. Or I can unlock with passcode, which certainly takes longer, requires looking at the phone rather than the road, and may violate local laws.

The current iPhone TouchID mechanism is one of the main reasons I use my iPhone more than my Nexus 6. It's simple; it's fast; it's safe. Getting rid of this, even as an option, and going 100% FaceID is a huge step backwards for my use cases.

I'm assuming you are trolling, but anyway ... The question here isn't guilt or innocence, as stated in the summary. Guilt has already been determined before these algorithms are then applied to attempt to predict the likelihood that the convicted will be a repeat offender. Sentence lengths are then determined (in part) based on this score.

And it is, of course, highly unlikely that race is even an input into the system. It is, however, still possible that other criteria which might be used (income, education level, home address, etc.) could cause the system to end up predicting that members of one race are more likely to be repeat offenders than those of another.

In that case, I wonder if this has the potential to trigger disparate impact rules.

Right - 3D was/is at its best when adding depth to scenes, rather than the more-gimmicky "pop into the audience" effects that so many movies tried.

Most Disney and Pixar animations also look great in 3D, adding depth and avoiding gimmicks.

Agreed, Spider-Man (Universal Studios Islands of adventure in Orlando, and Universal Studios in Osaka, Japan) is an absolutely amazing ride which is able to fool the senses even after riding it many, many times. Although it's been around (in Orlando at least) and winning "best ride" awards year-after-year in 3D since the park's opening in 1999, it wasn't until 2012 that it was even upgraded to HD, leaving you to wonder which is really more important :-).

And no, you aren't falling at all, or even barely moving. I'm pretty sure the effect is due to (1) the fact that the camera angle, of course, is straight down and shows you falling off a tall building, (2) there is a slight incline (but nowhere near 90 degrees) to the ride car to throw your senses into confusion about your true orientation, (3) wind machines make it feel like you are moving much faster than you are (although you are still running around 5 mph), and (4) the screen completely takes up your entire 3D field of view, leaving you with no other frame of reference.

And for those reading this that either don't know what TreeStyleTabs is or why it is useful ... Modern widescreens make vertical screen space a premium. Most web layouts, of course, are vertical as well. Meaning your content and tab UI at the top (or bottom) of the screen are competing for the same space. TreeStyleTabs, among other features, moves the tab bar to a vertical list on the side, in an area of the screen that probably isn't being used for anything in the first place, and allows you to view more content vertically on the screen at one time.

I probably would never have tried it without the great explanation of someone touting its benefits in an Arstechnica thread, so hopefully repaying that here in this thread for others.

And yes, to tack on a reply to another comment to this parent, it's nice that Vivaldi brings the same base-feature to a Blink-based core.

It kind of feels like you started out on one thought in the subject line, which would have been on-topic, but then you went a bit off-topic on a rant on Mac hardware (not that you're wrong). But I think your original point, as expressed in the subject line, is that Mac OS would be a good alternative to Windows if it was available for PCs.

So let me address that point ... Uh, no :-). Two reasons:

- First, one of the biggest reasons that OS X/Mac OS "just works" is because Apple is able to tightly control the hardware, and has limited choice in models as a result. The slow upgrade cycle and limited hardware options that you highlight as issues are the very same reasons why they are so successful in software. If Apple had to support as many different hardware types and configurations as Microsoft does with Windows, I strongly believe they would struggle to achieve anywhere near the same level of software quality.

- Second, and more debatable, the topic at hand is how Microsoft is locking down the OS more and taking away user options. But isn't Apple a much greater offender in this regard? OS X may have started out more open, but it seems to me that it has started to move more in the direction of iOS in recent years.