Taxes, when spent appropriately and for a good goal are not a bad thing. And no, I don't mean in the "let's cure the world from stupidity" way.

And, as just one small part of what that background science didn't help with, think on that the next time you use your microwave to reheat leftovers, or your GPS gear without having to pay subscription rates for the satelite signal...

just sayin'

Not really... At least not on the part of Time Warner, or not intentionally anyway.

Once the broadcasters got word of what they were offering, they told TW to pull it as they do not believe that this is covered under their current carriage agreement (the contract that lets a cable operator show content from a broadcaster http://www.fcc.gov/mb/facts/cblbdcst.html).

oh, but to bring back the original Hampster Dance!!!

*nostalgic swoon*

Agreed. It would be interesting to know if they ran the same test with the data service actually turned off on the phone. Then I'd start to see fault with the carrier.

meh... making it look easy only means that they were doing their job well, thus worth the money... Yeah, put the popcorn kid up there... he'd do it for less.

managers *sigh*

Assuming that you're trying this out on OSes newer than Win2k, powershell may make a nice alternative. You can use the same structures that you're familiar with in command and the ability to add more complex components when/if needed.

Someone find the house full of Popped Corn!!!

The Monopolistic abuse was the inclusion of IE and the mandating of its sole inclusion with every shipped computer/os combo. That has been enforced, and now manufacturers can in fact ship with Mozilla, Opera, or even Safari pre-loaded. How many do?

The analogy is poor, I'll grant you, but in no means meaningless. It's simply that you cannot expect to be able to buy a piece of modern hardware ~and~ have it pre-installed with an OS that is not the lastest offering. If Dell still had stacks of Latitudes from 2005, already OEM imaged, she could probably buy one and they'd happily ship to get it out of a warehouse...

As for monopolistic powers and enforcement; your whine privilege has been revoked. Go buy a Mac and tell them that you want it shipped with Jaguar. Or try Emperor Linux and ask them to load RedHat version 4.2 (and not RHEL, btw). How much would either charge if they'd do it at all?

Not at all: you can choose vista home basic, vista home premium, vista professional, etc etc etc...

Just 'cause it's a poor and/or overused analogy doesn't mean that it's entirely false.

Not true. Under the First Sale doctrine, you are allowed to resell your retail license of Windows as long as your sale includes all media and materials (assuming the manuals survived) and that you have removed all copies (running or backup) from your possession. OEM licenses are, in fact different as they were discounted based on the purchase being made ~with~ a specific piece of hardware. Dell subsidizes an OS that they bought in bulk from MS. No magic or mischief there.

the analogies are fun, however, I don't think that the woman in question was buying a ~laptop~ from 2 or more years ago... those packaged with XP originally. She was purchasing a newly manufactured laptop and wanted a customization of the operating system. Customizations cost money in nearly any commodity product. The "car" in my original analogy was ~not~ the operating system, but the gear that it comes on.

Sticking with cars: would BMW charge you extra if you wanted to trade out the plush leather seats for a vinyl alternative? I believe they would, even though the cost-difference to tool and manufacture them are negligible.

This would be like suing ford or gm for not continuing to keep last years engines for sale in new cars... this is just silly.