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Comment Is it piracy when I pay the TV tax? (Score 4, Insightful) 447

Here in Sweden, I pay a TV tax. This tax goes to paying for state owned TV channels. They broadcast Game of Thrones without commercials. There are no advertisers being hurt, and my TV tax goes to paying HBO for the syndication rights. The issue is I do not like seeing the subtitles that are burned in. I also like my show at the highest resolution with surround sound.

So is it piracy when I download it rather than watching it directly from syndication?

Comment Re:You can't eliminate them (Score 3, Interesting) 825

In other countries this is solved by laws demanding that all prices advertised to individuals (as opposed to companies) or where the target customer is clearly an individual include sales tax. So prices including the sales tax are conveniently set to nice round numbers.

Sweden just had an issue where including the tax in the price caused recently reduced taxes to not get passed to the customer.

Restaurants had a tax reduction from 25% to 12.5%. Since the tax was already included in the price, none of the restaurants reduced the prices and just pocketed the profit. If the price shown was pre-tax and the tax added in tally, the customer would have received the tax break.

The only ones that actually reduced their prices was the large food chains. Most likely because watch dog groups were making sure of this.

Comment Re:I wonder (Score 1) 200

How long it will be till TVs come with Kinects built in, and can't be turned off. It would be an advertiser's wetdream, and then the DHS could use it to monitor those who might be a "threat to national Security" (everyone).

One word: Tape.

Comment The Wii started offering Demos (Score 1) 379

Surprisingly, the Nintendo Wii began offering demos of Wiiware titles, and to a limited extent short time demos of Virtual console titles (such as through Super Smash Bros Brawl). The only companies that have something to worry about are the ones releasing horrible games where the demo causes people to test and not purchase the full version.

The movie industry offers demos in the form of Previews. Although comparing the two are like apple and oranges.

Comment Re:Dinosaurs (Score 1) 326

I have a Swedish and an Australian SIM card. Each of which cost less than US$ 10 and included a bunch of minutes and free or nearly-free (international!) texting and cheap and easy-to-get refills. Both of which "just work" every place I've tried to use them.

Except one. The US... where they want 10 times that much just for the SIM and they can't even guarantee that it'll work in both Florida and New Jersey!

When I went to Sweden, I found the first news paper stand I could find, bought a SIM card for US$10 and got US$15 in credit. Yes, they gave me 5 dollars more in credit. And the best part, my pre-pay Swedish SIM card worked Internationally, I tested in Japan and the US. The refill process is simple as getting a code printed receipt from a number of places, you text the code and you get refill confirmation. All your minutes are valid for a year upon refilling, including your previous minutes, even with the cheapest refill amount. They even offer campaigns such as free internet days, 3000 international SMSes if you refill with $25, and etc.

US carriers such as T-Mobile, offer Prepay, but the damn SIM only works in the US, will not register internationally, require a purchase of the SIM at double what I paid in Europe without credit on it, and expires in mere months.

Music

Submission + - Alltunes.com lets users download AllofMP3 songs (computerworld.com.au)

Stony Stevenson writes: Although the controversial online music store AllofMP3.com was officially shutdown by the Russian Government this week for infringing copyright laws, customers from the site who have existing credit can still purchase songs through its downloadable windows desktop and smartphone client, allTunes.com.

From the article: "A former AllofMP3.com user, who spoke to Computerworld on the condition of anonymity, purchased songs with his existing credit from the allTunes software client today and experienced no trouble doing so."

AllofMP3's six million users will no doubt be delighted they can use their leftover credit to purchase songs, but the site's longevity hangs in the balance. Just days after the Russian Government shut down AllofMP3.com, its sister site, MP3Sparks.com, suffered the same fate.

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