There was no need for them to "band together," as Apple Pay allows each card issuer to individually choose how much verification to do.

Apple Pay is built on top of standardized front-end payment infrastructure, and competing systems can be (and are being) built on that infrastructure as well. It's analogous to being able to visit, say, either Google or Bing from the same computer; the world doesn't need to agree on a single standard search engine if multiple search engines can be accessed via the same front-end (in that case, the web browser and user's Internet connection), and in fact user choice is better enabled if it doesn't.

To be clear, the fraud here isn't in the technical implementation in Apple Pay, it's in the card verification procedures, which Apple deliberately leaves entirely up to banks. Each bank can do as much or as little verification as it wants, or even do different amounts of verification on a card-by-card basis if they like (based on a risk profile of a particular customer or whatever). So, bailing on Apple Pay isn't really in the cards here. Some banks clearly misjudged what the rate of fraud would be if they only did minimal card verification, but they can change that whenever they want to.

Literally every time there's some new bit of Mac malware, we see a chorus of predictions in the form of "This is it, now the floodgates are going to open!" This has been going on for years, and these predictions have all been wrong. There are a couple of a new threats a year, and there isn't actually any particular reason to believe we're on the cusp of a dramatic non-linear increase.

As for accessing Microsoft's online services... a huge fraction of the apps in the app store access various companies' online services. I'm not sure what you see being the problem there. The only real restriction Apple has with respect to this sort of thing is that if you provide a link to a web site to subscribe to a paid service or purchase paid content, you have to also sell that subscription/content via in-app purchasing (and give Apple its cut). But if you don't link, you don't have to do this, and you can still give your customers access to that subscription or content if they find your web site and purchase on their own.

It's true Apple probably wouldn't let Microsoft support scripting in Office for iPad. Apple allows developers to embed scripting engines now, but all the code they run has to be bundled in the app package so Apple can review it; apps can't load code later, which is what would be happening with scripts embedded in Office documents. But honestly, scripting is kind of an edge case. Yes, some organizations use it extensively, but realistically 99% of Office documents in the world make zero use of scripting functionality. Microsoft shipped Office 2008 for Mac without VBA, and while they did bring it back to the Mac in 2011, this clearly demonstrates they don't consider lack of scripting a release showstopper.

This is kind of the point of the linked article, actually. The business world built up this notion over a couple of decades that any device (or software alternative to Office) that didn't provide 100% compatibility and 100% of the feature set was useless. The widespread adoption of iOS/Android devices that don't run Office has provided a significant amount of first-hand experience that this isn't true -- that a lot of routine business tasks work just fine without Office. This realization is dangerous to Microsoft.

I'm out-pedanted. Cool.

What makes it possible to extract energy from food is the extreme unlikelihood of finding something easily oxidized and lots of oxygen in the same place. Enthalpy. Gibbs free energy. Not potential energy. Potential energy is when you drop a can on your foot.

Not that actual, you know, thermodynamics, belongs anywhere near an AGW discussion.

As a result of the 1971 SCOTUS decision http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Griggs_v._Duke_Power_Co it's extremely dangerous to an employer to use perceived aptitude in hiring decisions. The gap has been filled by wasting 4+ years out of the life of all kinds of people (with no interest in learning per se) who need a certificate of aptitude that is immune to discrimination lawsuits. The badges are designed to serve the same need. Let competition roll!

I see that protectionism is something you are against, as am I. Hail fellow, well met!

Do you agree with me that no moral case can be made for further impoverishing workers in poor countries to further enrich incredibly rich (by world standards) US union members?

It's not that I don't get the politics of protectionism, I just have this little conscience problem when I consider the big picture.

Obviously because my Latin-fu is weak!

Over a period of decades, a brand can cultivate a reputation for fairness and accuracy, and thereby develop a very valuable property. But proud brands fall on hard times, and wind up in the hands of MBAs who know how to mine the residual value as they (as a direct result) become completely worthless. HP, anyone?

In the end caveat emptor rules. That said, the formal study of rhetoric as a branch of logic is very helpful in diagnosing the quality of arguments. And anyone who disagrees with me is a big fat (ad hominem) meanie, and I'll punch (ad baculam) them right in the lip if they don't shut up. And I hope you'll forgive my (appeal to sympathy) if I indulge in a completely worthless (argumentum ad verecundiam) display of obsolete erudition tokens in hopes of bolstering my argument...

Honestly though, "I see what you did there" is a much funner reaction to bafflegab than "hunh?". As someone once more or less said, you can't be ignorant and free. Keep your powder dry, I hear there're Sophists at large...

Reality is what doesn't go away if you don't believe in it, but we s/are/have been/ rich enough to base our decisions on moonbeams and pixie dust, for a while. And the end of that while is hard upon us. I predict valuing truth over truthiness will be more common post-Reckoning.

Strict social rules don't cause careless conception. Prohibition creates, renders profitable, and intentionally[1] perpetuates criminality. Addiction? A personal choice.

So I think you're arguing a false parallel there.

[1] Biggest contributor to anti-weed forces in California? Prison guards' union. I couldn't make up stuff this evil, honest.

Well, there used to be this thing call "journalism". See, first you make up a story that Advances The Narrative, then you create evidence for it (in a font that wasn't invented at the time it was supposed to happen), and then you're Dan Rather. Truthiness rules!

Snark aside, the rules of the Old Journalism worked moderately well when they were followed. I think our current chaotic information pool will improve in quality as honest brokers of info bundling and verification services emerge and thus develop a reputation. Which will make them powerful, and interesting targets for corruption... Big wheel keeps on turnin'.