Because I'm concerned about privacy, I don't want to use an iPhone or a "normal" Android phone (with Google Play Services). And worse, I'm one of those insane crazy people who only turns the GPS on when it's actually needed, so it may not even work if I did use an iPhone, because it might not know that I'm "moving".

I don't want to have to upload my location to a trillion dollar company all the time to ensure that their other surveillance systems are not tracking me.

There does not appear to be a way to opt out of this system.

Any other tracking system is going to need a cellular modem and GPS and a large battery to operate. You can forego the modem if you're willing to install and then collect the device later. AirTags just need a small battery, the real work is offloaded to a billion iPhones. AirTags also offer criminals plausible deniability. "Oops, yeah, I accidentally left a key in that Uber driver's car." You can't say that if you stuck a cell-enabled GPS tracker to her car. These things will enable *casual* stalking.

It's not easier for you to track me with my cellphone. It's trivial for you to track me if you can get an AirTag into my possession.

My understanding so far of AirTags: Someone could stick one to the underside of my car, bicycle, or modify/disassemble one and shove it in my shoe while I'm swimming at the gym. If I had an iPhone and were sending my location to Apple constantly, they'd tell me that there was an AirTag following me. If I don't have an iPhone, I'd only know about it after 3 days when the speaker went off, unless I was came within range of a device controlled by the criminal actor, or if they trivially disabled the speaker. So the only way to protect by privacy is to give Apple money and my location at all times? And Apple has turned every iPhone/iPad/Mac into a global surveillance network without any user consent? And if they do ask for it, you'll be denied future security updates if you do not approve?

Can I buy a #$!^ing video card now?

I haven't tracked it, but the Fairphone 2 has had an official LineageOS build for a while, with weekly stable builds. https://download.lineageos.org...

<quote><p>You are FoS with your Federalist BS. If we can mount a national defense to foreign invaders, we should be able to mount a national defense against a virus. People like you parade a weakness like it's a strength.</p></quote>

The Federalists were more aligned with your position (strong central government): https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Federalist_Party

Recent innovations include:

* Innovative means of continuing to maintain a completely locked down network, even in the face of FCC regulations regarding LTE, in the name of security.
* Forcing device manufacturers to lock down bootloaders such that only Verizon can issue security updates.
* Failing to issue said security updates, creating insecure devices, forcing customers to upgrade.
* Requiring upgrading customers to obtain a downgraded (limited) data plan in order to qualify for subsidized phones. (You're always paying a subsidized price, whether or not your contract is currently subsidizing a phone.)
* Introducing a marketing strategy where eager users can pay twice for their subsidized phones if they'd like to upgrade early. (Do the math, it's not friendly, and is difficult to understand by design.

I'm sure there are plenty of legitimate innovations coming from Verizon. But it doesn't nearly make up for the harm they're doing to the future of mobile. Their primary mission is control, not customer satisfaction. They have a lot of customers, a lot of money, and most importantly, a lot of cell towers, which keeps us "happy enough" as customers.

How is this different from the folks who use kilogram-force? I just read a post on a motorcycle forum about an unfortunate individual who didn't know the difference between kgf*m and N*m on his torque wrench and managed to break three bolts in his cylinder head by applying 9.8 times more torque than necessary. Why anyone would label something in kgf*m (and why he continued torquing after breaking #1) is beyond me.

The imperial mass unit is slugs. The unit of force is pounds. Yes, you can use lbm, but it's no more revolting than kgf.

That said, I strongly support converting to metric.

I have the income to buy them. I have the desire to play them. I have the computer hardware to play them. And I won't pirate them.

But I won't pay you $50 or $60 and be rewarded with the very kind of stress that I've purchased the game to temporarily escape from. You're not going to stop the pirates, but you are going to stop me.

In the case of wireless, I couldn't agree more. I negotiate with my local grocery store and set a fixed price for the maximum amount of groceries I might need each month. It works great most of the time, except when unexpected company shows up at the end of the month and I wind up paying an extra $70/egg in overage charges.

I've been strongly offended by software patents ever since I learned over a decade ago about how meager the "innovations" they protect can be. I think most of us will make one or two "patentable innovations" per day before lunch, or at least infringe with some fundamental task like throwing an exception (never realizing we were "innovating" or "infringing" in the process).

So where should we send the money? I want to donate to an org that shares my opinions and is doing something about it. The two I know of are as follows, but would appreciate additional suggestions.

EFF Patent Busting Project: http://w2.eff.org/patent/wp.html
End Software Patents: http://endsoftpatents.org/donate

AT&T is the only US carrier who has disabled the ability to install applications from sources other than the Android market (e.g., that have been downloaded from the web). It's very ineffective, given that one can load anything they want via the Android Debug Bridge (ADB) which is part of the Android SDK.

From what I've seen, the T-Mobile G2 simply supports tethering out of the box. AT&T is currently hunting down customers who are using "illegal" tethering software.

Crapware-infested Android phones make for a truly awful experience. Those apps tend to be cobbled together and listen for events which they shouldn't, draining the battery and lagging the phone. Sure the advanced users can clean them off, but the average user will conclude that Android sucks and buy an iPhone next time.

...since they removed the jobs/hired goons section. It's a shame too, as the local one had excellent goons.

TFA is talking about moving from cable throttles to electronics and discusses hydraulics and hoses? I'm not putting much faith in TFA. Nor do I particularly place high esteem in arbitrary internet comments (as one should do with my commentary as well).

The point of my comment is that I'm questioning the information I'm hearing...it doesn't square with a lot of reported cases as well as knowledge of how these systems work. Referencing the same people I'm questioning isn't going to make me any more likely to believe it.

This may well be speculative crap, but at least based on the anecdotal incidents I keep hearing about, this sounds like an ECM problem.

First Toyota blamed floor mats. That immediately causes consumers to think that the problem was the fault of idiot drivers, not Toyota itself. The typical person's reaction would rightfully be something along the lines of "duh, if you stack floormats under the accelerator, it's going to stick...this is not Toyota's fault".

Now Toyota blames the pedal. And the pedal manufacturer. Again a simple system that people understand...that can be labeled as obviously defective and replaced with something theoretically not defective, bringing about peace of mind.

Finally Toyota is going to "go the extra mile" and update the ECMs to cause pressing the brake to cut the throttle. I imagine this is an algorithmic (code) change to the ECM, not just new calibrations. Apparently Toyota uses a proprietary ECM that is not very "hackable". That is, it's very closed in comparison to items like those in GMs and VW/Audis where there are cottage industries of tinkerers who have decompiled the code, modified calibrations for performance and economy, and even modified the algorithms themselves. (You don't see things like VAGCOM or EFILive for Toyotas.)

Point being, if they update the ECM and it is all proprietary stuff and there's no easy way to diff it (or an adequate number of eyes to catch the difference) they can fix the problem and scapegoat the pedal manufacturer. And potentially leave a lot of dangerous vehicles on the road to save face.

The biggest hole I can find in this idea is where I'm getting my data. Random reports from people, a lot of whom seem to claim their vehicles accelerated from a stop. And of course it's all stuff reported by the popular news media. And of course a lot of folks who rear-ended someone in their Toyota are going to suggest anything other than their own actions being the cause.

But being a software developer, the more I hear about this, the more it stinks of software. An ECM has too many variables to simulate all possible conditions, so you must rely on the algorithms to work correctly. My gut says there's a tiny hole in there somewhere, where most users will never encounter it.