Don't be a pirate. Don't steal heads.

Do you really believe that Google NEVER assigns a human set of eyes to review emails - even when they're trying to better tune their ad-targeting algorithms?

Yeah, it's funny how people will apparently put thought into the question "given the choice, would you rather we cut off your arm or cut off your leg?" without considering that perhaps a third option is infinitely preferable.

You might want to flesh out how, exactly, you got from A to B there. If anything, abolishing copyright would make it easier for the school board to steal their students work.

I suppose the Seven Circles of Hell can be considered another universe...

iCloud will sync your own documents between your own devices - but it has ZERO support for collaboration/sharing with others.

So far, Apple's really dropped the ball on this one. I'm a web guy, but even I work often enough with non-computing folks to realize collaboration tools are essential in today's workplace.

Just reread parent post, and realized I misread it. AC is pretty much saying what I said. Don't know that it matters whether the app itself is free, though, since the real money will be in the subscription.

They don't need to make them free. They just need to follow Amazon's model with the Kindle app - don't have a purchase option in the app, require that it be handled via Microsoft's website. It's a small annoyance, and so less than optimal... but doable.

In this instance, I'm more on Microsoft's side than on Apple's. Having MS Office available on the iPad would be a boon for work - beneficial to Apple's customers, especially given that Apple basically offers zero support for collaboration with others on documents. Apple should be willing to negotiate their "cut" in these sorts of situations - so Microsoft: Yes, negotiate; Amazon: Yes; Rovio? probably not.

Let me guess - some soldier stole your girlfriend.

Well, technically it is possible - but you don't get much of a video stream with only a handful of bits per second.

Copyright Infringement Time!

The Super Bowl
The Super Bowl
The Super Bowl
The Super Bowl
The Super Bowl
The Super Bowl

I have no problems with the military doing what they can to maintain or improve the morale of their troops. I know a handful of soldiers, and they're just trying to do their job and (as they see it) serve their country to the best of their ability. When I take issue with the policies of the military, I lay blame with the president and with congress.

I do, however, have issues with the fact that my Seahawks didn't make it to The Super Bowl.

Yeah, in support of your thoughts: I can state, from first-hand experience as a former AT&T pay as you go customer, their store staff have absolutely no issue telling you they don't/won't/can't support you - so I can't see why AT&T couldn't do that with smartphone users that don't want data.

However I don't blame the GP, he is stuck in the role of explaining his employer's official position. I've had to toe that line myself a few times. I'm not very good at it, unfortunately (I love to shoot my mouth off) - but when you don't toe the company line with your end users, things can get uncomfortable rather quickly.

As a side note - AT&T also requires a data plan for their pay as you go smartphone customers, even if the customer doesn't use data. They used to offer some very low cost data plans you could use alongside a 10 cents a minute phone plan, at least; but now they're forcing people into a minimum expenditure of $30/month (required smartphone+text is $25, IIRC; and they require at least their lowest data plan of $5). So I switched to T-Mobile, who has a $30/month plan that's actually a great deal for people who basically just use text and data but hardly make phone calls (on AT&T I stuck mostly to wi-fi networks, but with T-Mobile I don't bother - but I still use less than a gigabyte a month).

As a second side note - although their advertising targets older individuals, Consumer Cellular is an AT&T MVNO with some very attractive, low cost plans for people like the guy in this story. I'm considering switching my wife's phone to them - she "really wants an iPhone", but hardly ever texts, uses almost no data, and doesn't make many phone calls.

I had wondered what all those guys had been up to since 2000 - now I know!

Yes, of course - but the claim was that simply typing this magic string could crash just about any program in Mountain Lion.

Yeah, THERE'S a good idea - apply a binary patch from some random post on Slashdot!