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Comment The problem is in the subtext (Score 5, Informative) 606

by The_DoubleU (#45712985) Attached to: Amazon Workers Strike In Germany As Christmas Orders Peak

The union says Amazon workers receive lower wages than others in retail and mail-order jobs and that other retailers pay overtime, but Amazon does not. Amazon has defended its wage policies, saying that employees earn toward the upper end of the pay scale of logistics companies in Germany.

Please note that the union sees the work as a mail-order job, where wages are higher.
Amazon thinks of it as a logistics job.
The union demands that Amazon recognize that the workers are in the mail-order business and pay accordingly.
Operating Systems

Sony Refuses To Sanction PS3 "Other OS" Refunds 396

Posted by Soulskill from the you-paid-for-what-we-say-you-paid-for dept.
Stoobalou writes "Sony says that it has no intention of reimbursing retailers if they offer users partial refunds for fat PS3s. Last week, the first PS3 user successfully secured a partial refund from Amazon UK as compensation for the removal of the ability to run Linux on the console. The user quoted European law in order to persuade the online retailer that the goods he had bought in good faith were no longer fit for his purposes because of the enforcement of firmware update 3.21, which meant that users who chose to keep the Other OS functionality would lose the ability to play the latest games or connect to the PlayStation Network."
Role Playing (Games)

Sims 3 Expansion Announced 84

Posted by Soulskill from the hundreds-of-new-ways-to-torture-your-sim dept.
EA has announced that The Sims 3 will be getting its first expansion pack on November 16th, titled World Adventures. It will be available at first for the PC and Mac clients, and later for mobile platforms. "Players can take their Sims on new journeys to famous real-world inspired destinations around the globe for the first time ever and seek out new adventures. ... From mastering martial arts in Shang Simla, China, discovering rich culture and famous landmarks on a romantic getaway to Champs Les Sims, France or exploring the depths of ancient tombs in Al Simhara, Egypt, players can take their Sims on a journey that will change their Sims' lives." EA's Lyndsay Pearson spoke further about the expansion in an interview with IGN.

Comment Re:Why Should Verizon Compromise At All? (Score 0, Troll) 106

by The_DoubleU (#28740917) Attached to: Verizon Offers Compromise In Exclusivity Debate

Say you have a DSL line with AT&T and want to buy a Dell laptop to use with that connection but you can't because only Verizon is allowed to sell Dells with their DSL line. If you want to use AT&T DSL then you have to buy a Mac. (Linux is supported on both networks but only 56K connections)

The customer should be allowed to buy any mobile device they want and then go to a service provider to get a connection. So the customer can get the best choice for them. The phone they want + the service they want.

Comment Re:I'm a guy (Score 1) 708

by The_DoubleU (#28099197) Attached to: Sony CEO Proposes "Guardrails For the Internet"

Couldn't agree more. And the people in the USA have some great service like Hulu. Not so much here in Ireland.
Example. I have BBC channels in my TV subscription and they talk about their iPlayer as a great service to watch an episode that you might have missed. Great! Oops, UK only because of license restrictions.
No worries, I can download an episode from iTunes, Apple is making a lot of hype about that. Oops, not available in Ireland.
Ah, I will check out Hulu.com. Sorry not available for me due to license restrictions.
Let's go to the official website of House, to name a populair TV series. "Sorry, episodes are only available in the USA" Again license restrictions.
So now I subscribe to a great USEable NET and for just a few euro's a month I can watch any episode I want. That money could have gone to the creators but they can't seem to find a way to get it to me. I would pay 50c per streaming episode or watch a few commercials.
They need to realize that the world is now global for the consumers too. Stop with the artificial borders, put it online for a cheap and a lot of people will pay for it. They might even buy the DVD set. Some people will still pirate it but they wouldn't pay for it anyway so no lost sale but the restrictions you have now are stopping people who are willing to pay.
Take a look at eMusic, I'm a subscriber for 1,5 years now 90 songs for 22 euro and I have the feeling that more of that money goes to the artist then if I would buy the CD.
Games

Early Reviews Reflect Well On Mirror's Edge 73

Posted by Soulskill from the faith-is-rewarded dept.
The much-anticipated first person non-shooter Mirror's Edge is being released today for the Xbox 360 and Playstation 3. Reviews for the game, while not without complaints, are generally positive. 1Up praises the controls, saying, "It gets things very right very early, distilling its first-person platformer ambitions into a very manageable control scheme. ... Once you're familiar with Faith's abilities and their limitations — imparted through a much-needed tutorial — it's easy to see potential routes through the world." Ars Technica is more critical, noting that the main story's gameplay only clocks in at about six hours, and that the artistic style doesn't vary much between levels. Nick Channon, a producer for Mirror's Edge, sat down with Gamasutra and discussed the reasoning for some of their design choices. The PC version of Mirror's Edge and some additional downloadable content will be available in January.
Networking

Submission + - Timewarner DNS Hijacking

Submitted by
Exstatica
Exstatica writes: "It looks like Timewarner is taking botnets into their own hands. They've hijacked dns for a few irc servers. The latests being irc.vel.net, irc.mzima.net, and irc.nac.net all part of EFNet. Using ns1.sd.cox.net the lookup returns an ip for what looks to be a script that forces the user into a channel and issues a set of commands to clean the drones. There have been different reports of other irc networks being hijacked and other dns servers involved. Is this the right way to handle this? Is hijacking DNS illegal?"
Software

Submission + - Asked to install Pirated Software, what do you do?

Submitted by
An anonymous reader writes: I am an IT professional, and due to budget constraints, I have been told to install multiple copies of MS Office, despite offering to install OpenOffice, and other OpenSource Office products. Even though most of the uses are for people using Excel like a database, or formatting of text in cells, other programs are not tolerated. I have been over ruled by our controller, to my disagreement. Other than drafting a letter to the owners of the company on how I disagree with the policy, what else can I do? I would never turn them in, but I am in tough place by knowing doing something illegal. I want to keep my job, but disagree with some of the decision making on this issue.
Sony

Submission + - Sony's new DVDs not working in some players

Submitted by Anonymous Coward
An anonymous reader writes: It seems that the most recent DVDs released by Sony, specifically "Stranger Than Fiction","Casino Royale", and "The Pursuit of Happyness", have some kind of "feature" that makes them unplayable on many DVD players. This doesn't appear to be covered by the major media yet, but This Link to Amazon Discussions gives a flavor of the problems people are experiencing. This blogger apparently called Sony and was told the problem is with the new copy protection scheme, and they do not intend to fix it; it's up to the manufacturers to update their hardware. Is it a sound strategy for a company to institute a copy protection scheme that prevents a good chunk of legitimate customers from buying their movies?

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