If the person caught doing this wants to claim he did NOT have insider information, he'll have to explain how he managed to obtain the information prior to the information actually being released, regardless of when he executed the trade.

In this country, the burden of proof is on the prosecution, not the defendant. In this situation, the trader could easily say that they prepared the trade in advance based on circumstantial evidence that convinced them to make the bet. The SEC would need to compile other information documenting the insider access. The timing of the trades is of little consequence without a supporting collection of evidence.

I know this isn't a valid argument for why the Surface didn't take off, but it really is the customer's fault for not wanting it.

I know what you mean here, but usually gargantuan investments in a product like this are protected from the "customer's fault" through focus groups. Proper market research can determine whether a certain set of capabilities are going to sell at price points above per-unit production costs.

Ballmer has been ignoring these tools since before he laughed at the iPhone as being the most expensive phone on the market. He continued to ignore competitive market research when he doubted developers would write apps for the iPhone while Apple took a 30% cut of app sales.

The Ballmer-led Microsoft has been hardheaded about what customers should want and believes it can dictate what customers should buy as it could do where Microsoft was able to leverage its OS monopoly. Those days are over.

I don't know how crazy it is. It's 3 smart phones with unlimited texting and voice and 6 GB of data aggregate across the three devices (family plan). I would guess your low bill is due to not having data/limited data, which is a no go for us.

I'll give it a look, however. I have 5 phones clear and free of contracts. Maybe I can put my kid on something like that and save a buck or two.

You want a citation? Ok, common knowledge and generally accepted facts need no citation. This is especially true when the information is something readers should already know, readily accept, and easily find in general references (like the Internet or paying attention in life).
~APA Publication Manual (5th edition). I might have embellished the last part.

One example of common knowledge and a readily accepted fact would be that modern cars are far more reliable than cars from the 1980s. So if you want to bring anecdotal evidence that flies squarely in the face of common knowledge, then the burden of citation is upon you.

I hate to be a douche about it, but you kind of asked for it. And technically speaking, I asked you to "site" it. Not sure what the hell I was thinking there.

Phones "only a few hundred dollars - less in America". Yeah, good luck with that. New smart phones are $199, sure, but I pay $250 a month for three data plans and three phones and I get a hefty employee discount. When I was young, I would have NEVER prioritized a phone, at current expense, over other things. Phone plans are like a car payment, but it never ends as long as you are using a phone. It's no wonder young people don't have cable, or sometimes, cars.

Reasons to never visit a chain theater again. They are worse than chain restaurants. If you can, go to a local "movie and brews" type place. Alamo Draft House, for example here in Austin. No lines - you buy online, you print your ticket, you reserve your seat, they bring food to you. Bonus: they ban texting and talking and don't let people in after the movie starts. THAT'S how to run a theater. Not 3 gallon buckets of popcorn for $10, not gimmicky Movie premieres. Good food, good beer, good service, and no moronic customers allowed.

Maybe you could site a modern first generation car...something maybe in the 21st century? I think you might find that new car quality is at a high-point.

Like Sears, MS exploited an unique market position to enter many other markets.

This comparison is very accurate. If you spend much time on eBay or Craigslist, you're sure to see vintage products branded as Sears or Montgomery Wards. Crazy stuff that sometimes makes you scratch your head wondering why they ever thought it would be a lucrative product segment that they'd make any kind of money offering an in-house brand.

I once found an old snowmobile suit in a thrift store with a Montgomery Wards label. At the time, I wondered how many snowmobile suits were ever sold that Montgomery Wards felt they needed to get into the market. I guess they were playing hardball with the manufacturers at the time and cut a deal with one vendor to make MW-labelled suits and that positioned them to tell dictate pricing to the other venders lest they not be carried alongside the MW snomobile suits.

My wife was a non-traditional student recently. We bought an iPad because one term of books cost more than the iPad. Nobody told us the e-books were gonna be just as expensive as the physical books, and they expired to boot. Not the iPad's fault, but iPad-as-cost-savings is a pretty short sighted strategy.

She did like not having to carry 25 lbs. of books around in 100+ temps though.

Exactly this. Microsoft just keeps piling on layers of code to existing legacy code in fear of losing that Microsoft Word 4.0 user, at the expense of everyone else.

Blasphemy! Microsoft has made lots of really cool things, like Songsmith!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3oGFogwcx-E

I have a simpler analysis of the decision makers at Microsoft. They never consider "just make good stuff that people want to buy" as a plausible business model.

If you don't think iOS is stealing from Microsoft's (and Apple's) OS market, you are delusional.

This comment makes me sad for humanity. Also, if this were true, why do they serve 3 gallon servings of soda? That just makes bigger asses, allowing for fewer asses per screening.

And here I was being all pragmatic and equating "flop" with "bad movie". Lest I forget, I live in the land of the stupid where the only thing that matters is making money.