@Software_Goddess: I'm so embarrassed. Despite my self-proclaimed, wildly-progressive politics and strong pro-woman/minority/LGBT/etc. outlook, it had not registered on me that this clock is geared only for men. Aargh!
Perhaps they could hire Judi Dench to make an alternate version suitable for m'lady?
Somewhere back in time, my deep aversion to horrible, rank, screech-inducing alarm clocks grew so strong that, somehow, over the years, my body developed its own remarkably accurate internal clock with alarm. While I still will set a real alarm--just to play safe--I would estimate that 95-98% of the time I will naturally wake up (rested and pleasant) 5-10 minutes before the accursed alarm can go off.
My internal clock is good enough that, even when I wake in the middle of the night (bathroom, whatever) I know without looking at a clock what time it is within 5 minutes. Sadly, despite this marvelous, internal bio-chrono-mechanism, I still am typically late for all appointments--but I always know, without a watch, exactly how late I am.
Quaint, but ultimately, this pales in comparison to my computer blaring Good Morning Beautiful by Deftones at 80% volume. All that'll happen with this thing is that I'll have that voice incorporated into my dream.
@djtooshay: You can also get banned for asking "why is this story even vaguely relevant or interesting outside of may-hay-hay-be those knowing whom Stephen Fry is?", so I would never ask that.
Iphone has only been a positive thing for Blackberry fans. Its forced RIM to add features, and even the top end Bold is free on contract at many retailers in Canada.
Now that the Vista hate has died down, people needed something else to nag on, and it looks like the storm was the unlucky recipitent
@SuperSan: In all fairness though, "failure to live up to advertising" is a perfectly legitimate reason to hate a product. And, the higher the hype, the greater the letdown. "Does not work as advertised" can be the kiss of death for a product and it may have killed the Storm line right out of the gate.
The hype/letdown dilemma wasn't unforeseeable given Verizon's history. Verizon has a long-history of Apple-style bombardment of the airwaves to push a flagship phone. Verizon spends nearly $1 billion per year on ads (and makes Apple's $250 million look modest in comparison). I refer you to the LG Chocolate, which debuted in 2006 to much hype. Sadly, the UI was bad, the battery life poor, and the buttons wonky.
It would be wonderful if companies would do some in-the-wild real-world testing of phones before release. However, because marquee phones require buyers to shackle themselves to two-year contracts, neither manufacturers nor carriers have an incentive.
@eth3l: I can only imagine that someone who has a slightly deeper well of funding can take a $4K laptop purchase more lightly. Also, the Dell is probably just as much a POS as any one of those Vaios machines.
I should clarify the rather public issues I had with a new Vaio and Vista the other day. It was reported on Gizmodo ([gizmodo.com]) and elsewhere that I had lost my rag trying to connect wirelessly. An inspection of my latest stream of tweets on [twitter.com] will confirm that I was less than temperate.
For those who think I was being unfair on either Vista or Sony, I should explain that I wasn't trying to set up a new network, I wasn't doing anything even vaguely complicated. There was a WEP security-enabled network in the room already to which a G1 phone, 2 Blackberry devices, iPhones, an iPod Touch and two Macs were all happily connected. A hotel room.
I introduce a brand new computer, fire it up and try to get it simply to connect to this already existing network. If it was tricky to create a network, to alter a router's parameters, to change SSID's Ð anything like that, I would buckle down and do it, certainly not blaming Vista, for it is always tricky to set up new wireless networks. What was so extraordinary in the year 2008 was that an expensive new piece of kit was unable to join a simple 40 bit WEP secured network. It saw the network, it agreed with me that it existed, I clicked to connect and it failed. Not surprisingly, as at no stage in trying to connect did it ask me for a password or offer a field in which to insert one. It offered to 'diagnose' the problem. Its diagnosis being that I was unable to connect. 'Doctor, I have a headache.' 'Mm. My diagnosis is that you have a headache. Leave your cheque with my secretary.' Bleugh.
I've literally never had a problem dealing with Vista. And I have a new Vista machine at work starting today so we'll see how that works out.
On our new MacPro the other day and I wanted to change some graphics settings. We were having slight quicktime playback problems, and we tried just about everything and I wanted to go into my detailed graphics card settings and tweak some things.
Only. You can't. Not on a mac...I'm talking detailed 3D and Image settings that are easily available via the nVidia control panel on a PC. They aren't available on a mac...only refresh rate/resolution/and color depth.
What is that nonsense? That is absolutely ridiculous. What? Is it to hold the normal computer illiterate masses who buy macs away from detailed settings less they screw something up? I bought a goddamned dual quad core 3.2 ghz machine with 16 gigs of RAM (RAM not from apple buy the way since they wanted 3 fucking grand for it...Newegg for 600)...I think I'm entitled to a little control over my machine.
Go ahead Giz and print that as an article since it has just as much substance as this nonsense that you just posted. But I guess that's ok since it's anti-Microsoft, but anything anti-Apple gets quietly swept under the rug. Off to engadget I go!
A friend of mine having problems with Vista called tech support and the lady gave him all sorts of scripted advice about how great Vista was. Then he asked her what she used at home. She said "I use XP, what are you crazy?!" and sold him XP to roll back his OS.
05/20/09
05/20/09
Well, on second thought, I guess it DOES have to do with getting me up.
05/20/09
05/20/09
Perhaps they could hire Judi Dench to make an alternate version suitable for m'lady?
05/20/09
My internal clock is good enough that, even when I wake in the middle of the night (bathroom, whatever) I know without looking at a clock what time it is within 5 minutes. Sadly, despite this marvelous, internal bio-chrono-mechanism, I still am typically late for all appointments--but I always know, without a watch, exactly how late I am.
05/20/09
02/03/09
"Just took a dump. Kind of leafy and loose. Wiped twice cuz it was wet. Still, better than being backed up."
I'm sure this is what Al Gore had in mind when he invented the internet.
02/03/09
Seriously, I thought there was a story last year about the same thing happening to him...
02/03/09
02/03/09
02/03/09
02/03/09
Google it.
02/04/09
12/30/08
12/30/08
12/30/08
Now that the Vista hate has died down, people needed something else to nag on, and it looks like the storm was the unlucky recipitent
12/30/08
The hype/letdown dilemma wasn't unforeseeable given Verizon's history. Verizon has a long-history of Apple-style bombardment of the airwaves to push a flagship phone. Verizon spends nearly $1 billion per year on ads (and makes Apple's $250 million look modest in comparison). I refer you to the LG Chocolate, which debuted in 2006 to much hype. Sadly, the UI was bad, the battery life poor, and the buttons wonky.
It would be wonderful if companies would do some in-the-wild real-world testing of phones before release. However, because marquee phones require buyers to shackle themselves to two-year contracts, neither manufacturers nor carriers have an incentive.
12/30/08
12/30/08
12/08/08
12/08/08
This guy is an idiot and I will never read his columns.
12/08/08
12/08/08
Me and My Vaio
I should clarify the rather public issues I had with a new Vaio and Vista the other day. It was reported on Gizmodo ([gizmodo.com]) and elsewhere that I had lost my rag trying to connect wirelessly. An inspection of my latest stream of tweets on [twitter.com] will confirm that I was less than temperate.
For those who think I was being unfair on either Vista or Sony, I should explain that I wasn't trying to set up a new network, I wasn't doing anything even vaguely complicated. There was a WEP security-enabled network in the room already to which a G1 phone, 2 Blackberry devices, iPhones, an iPod Touch and two Macs were all happily connected. A hotel room.
I introduce a brand new computer, fire it up and try to get it simply to connect to this already existing network. If it was tricky to create a network, to alter a router's parameters, to change SSID's Ð anything like that, I would buckle down and do it, certainly not blaming Vista, for it is always tricky to set up new wireless networks. What was so extraordinary in the year 2008 was that an expensive new piece of kit was unable to join a simple 40 bit WEP secured network. It saw the network, it agreed with me that it existed, I clicked to connect and it failed. Not surprisingly, as at no stage in trying to connect did it ask me for a password or offer a field in which to insert one. It offered to 'diagnose' the problem. Its diagnosis being that I was unable to connect. 'Doctor, I have a headache.' 'Mm. My diagnosis is that you have a headache. Leave your cheque with my secretary.' Bleugh.
12/08/08
On our new MacPro the other day and I wanted to change some graphics settings. We were having slight quicktime playback problems, and we tried just about everything and I wanted to go into my detailed graphics card settings and tweak some things.
Only. You can't. Not on a mac...I'm talking detailed 3D and Image settings that are easily available via the nVidia control panel on a PC. They aren't available on a mac...only refresh rate/resolution/and color depth.
What is that nonsense? That is absolutely ridiculous. What? Is it to hold the normal computer illiterate masses who buy macs away from detailed settings less they screw something up? I bought a goddamned dual quad core 3.2 ghz machine with 16 gigs of RAM (RAM not from apple buy the way since they wanted 3 fucking grand for it...Newegg for 600)...I think I'm entitled to a little control over my machine.
Go ahead Giz and print that as an article since it has just as much substance as this nonsense that you just posted. But I guess that's ok since it's anti-Microsoft, but anything anti-Apple gets quietly swept under the rug. Off to engadget I go!
12/08/08
12/08/08