I just love how they bring up the "% of folks who tested positive for marijuana" like every other slanted sound bite does when it comes to this supposed epidemic of stoned drivers. What they fail to clarify, as usual, is that the vast majority of those people were also drunk, on pills, and/or on other narcotics at the time, which is why they were being tested and presumably were impaired in the first place. They just happened to smoke a joint at some point during all their other drug use. The amount of folks who have only smoked marijuana at some point and driven dangerously enough to pull over is rather tiny.

Wow, HBO wasn't whistling Dixie earlier this year when the new season of their most popular show was premiering and they insisted they were working diligently on making their content more available, between the Amazon deal and now this.

The reason is simple: because Game of Thrones.

While it's still not hitting Sopranos in traditional ratings, between the HBOGO and DVR ratings it's estimated it's audience right up there with the largest scripted TV network show right now (beating BBT) - if you factor in pirating it's easily the most watched scripted television show currently in production worldwide, period.

Not only that, but the merchandising is making HBO a bundle right now - they can afford to take this route. Truth be told, I doubt the cable companies cared much - HBO is a huge PITA for them post-GoT, because folks sign up for three months just to watch it then drop it, and they clog the phone centers with "retention" calls to a huge degree trying to worm free HBO out of them for whatever complaint (which usually gets you 3 months, same length as a season).

I'm not a white hat, but I'm not a "download everything free mwhahahaha world owes me anyway" type either. That said - this pretty much takes any "valid" excuse away from pirating the show - and those that still do so are really crapping on the content. I know it won't change most, or even many, folks doing this - but if ever there was a time to support something financially, it's here. The money paid to HBO for subscriptions pays for these shows and keeps them on the air. There are no commercials, no subsidizing with other network divisions, etc. - this is as "real" and direct as it gets for directly supporting traditional content.

FWIW, this was my final impetus. I've been ready to dump cable for two years now (and if you knew how much I love TV you would find the notion itself shocking), but in the end, it was ease of access to HBO, Dallas on TNT (which just got canned), and Nick at Night - besides the "it's already installed" convenience factor - that are why I hadn't cut yet. With HBO accessible on it's own, Nick at Night isn't going to cut it for $150/month. All told, once I get alternate internet, Hulu, HBO, TiVo, etc. I'm going to be paying more like $80 a month for content, which is just fine with me (especially since I can cut those bills if need be or desire wanes much easier than just having to get rid of everything like you do with cable).

So props to HBO for taking the leap - I'll be signing up on day one.

I am impressed. It takes a real cocky idiot to anonymously scold and swear up a storm telling folks to RTFA when they apparently haven't RTFA themselves. Go back to iMore and get your tongue back under that troglodyte Rene Ritchie's seeping nut sack - the one he has left misses you.

That's like telling someone that "a space shuttle is really easy to use, someone on the ground actually presses the "launch" button for you!"

Sure, automated initial installs have been all wrapped up in little wizard-like packages. That's not the point, it's the ongoing installation and management of packages and versions and such that you have to keep up on.

I get Linux, I do. I have used it on spare PC's before. But I just don't have time to use it on my main machines, because while I'd love that much time to tinker around and do all kinds of clever things with it to hone it to be the ultimate OS for me - I just don't have that kind of time to spend on it consistently. You have to "keep up" with Linux as a hobby way too much for folks that just need to get tasks done on a PC when they sit at it (especially with tablets in the picture, as for a lot of us we spend a lot less time tied to larger machines since we do a lot of consumption that way now).

It's one of those things that I'm glad it's there, I wish I had time - and maybe someday, but since I don't install crap on my PC and I don't go to sketchy websites (well aside from this one LOL), and I take a modicum of security precautions, I do OK with Windows. I never have to ask if I can run something on my machine, why I buy a product that can connect to a PC via USB or network (camera, Blu-ray, etc.) I never have to wonder if the driver software will work for me or if I'll have to spend hours hoping to get it working with whatever I can scrounge up, I never have to search out solutions around how to do what I want, etc.

In the end, yeah, Windows, yuck, but deal-able, and it's really disingenuous to pretend that because they have dumb downed the initial install package to Windows levels, that the actual ongoing user experience of Linux is nearly that plug and play for most folks, so to speak.

Manhattan isn't underwater, nor does it appear to be in any danger of being so for quite some time, for one. (The height of the water level around Manhattan has gone up about a foot and a half since the mid-19th century when we started keeping track of it. This can largely be attributed to development since then such as deeper shipping lanes, etc. - i.e., we put a lot more shit in the water now than we used to - well, less untreated shit shit, but more of everything else.)

The Climate Change promoters were telling us in the 90's and even into the 00's that by now, we'd be close to losing the city.

Get those troll mod fingers ready (I have excellent karma, I can take it - and every troll mod vote when someone mentions the obvious on this topic is understood to be "that person has a really good point that I wish wasn't true" - just like true faith believers): the scientific community of 2014 is to the scientific community of 1955 as the Republican Party of 2014 is to the Republican Party of 1955.

'nuff said.

Countries that charge a higher sales tax/VAT often get many more services for their taxes, however. A least in Europe. For example, I'm fine with a 20% sales tax if it buys everyone healthcare. The US would be far better off under a much more sales tax oriented system, to begin with (as we have no national sales tax, period, only by state).

Of course, you don't tax necessities like that (the basics, food, clothing up to a certain amount, etc), but beyond that - if you can afford a $4000 TV, you can afford a $4800 TV. If you can buy a diamond ring for $10,000, you can afford $12,000. It's a more fair system to pay for things, where you don't tax folks as much for working as for spending.

Now, of course, that's in a relatively more ideal world where we aren't spending trillions of dollars on the useless drain of a war industry it would actually be used for, so in this case I think it doesn't matter how they get the money out of us because it's not being used to improve our lives or our country anyway.

True, but the gap of "standard knowledge" isn't as bad as it used to be. At least it's getting better. If any message has gotten through, it's been not to give out information to an unknown phone caller. I'm sure it must work sometimes or they wouldn't be doing it, but since email spam has been largely eliminated from most end-user experiences, it seems going back to the phone scams is a bit too late because folks are going to click on an email link much more readily than give out any info to an unknown phone caller these days.

I have a friend in her 50's who's parents are in their late 70's, and they just got one of these calls last week. To give you an idea of their technical proficiency, they still use AOL mail (and Facebook is too difficult for them to use). The caller wanted their windows installation ID. They kept them on the phone for like 20 minutes - while they used their other phone to call Microsoft, LOL. The scammer gave up when they realized what was going on, and they never gave them any personal info. So, even they knew something was "wrong" and didn't fall for it. That's just one anecdotal example, granted, but again these are the very folks that they are trying to get who have wised up and are especially vigilant about phone callers in particular (organizations like AARP are actually really good at educating folks about not falling for scams).

The funny (sad?) part was the parents understood exactly what happened during the attempted scam (bad guy trying to get their computer info), but what they didn't understand was why Microsoft didn't seem very interested in "getting 'em" after the fact - they wanted to fill out a report about the scam, etc., and MS basically said "you did the right thing, thanks, /click" - they just didn't understand why MS wasn't going to investigate further, call the phone company to get records, etc. That was the only difficult thing for them to understand and had to be explained to them, LOL. So even though they may not totally get the larger view of the picture, they knew not to give out any information which was the important part.

The S was a typo in BBTS though, should have just said BBT. My autocorrect fixed it to BBTS, as in Big Bad Toy Store, which is an online shopping site. As you can see, I'm a geek, among those that should be "offended" at BBT but I am not. :)

Local Comic Book Store.

Oh please. I don't think many of you have ever seen a sitcom before.

Sam Malone had a sex addiction problem. Monica Gellar had severe OCD. Roseanne had anger management issues.

That's what's hilarious about the folks who cry about BBT - they take it so seriously because it hits a lot closer to home than they would like folks to believe and they simply don't have the ability to laugh at themselves.

Did folks criticize Mary Tyler Moore Show for not being an accurate enough representation of life in a network news room? Probably, if they worked in one and didn't have a sense of humor.

As to TFA, I'm very glad for them - they earned this - this show is going to bring in billions because of the syndicated deal, the hell is merchandised out of it as well (I was at a LCBS yesterday and they had an entire section of BBTS merch), and they are getting a small cut now. Is everyone on TV overpaid to some extent, sure. But comparatively, these are not outrageous salaries, particularly in this current climate of a hit TV show being as rare as it is, particularly on networks. If the entire industry is going to rake in such money, I'm glad that the folks in front of the camera who are largely responsible for my enjoyment of the show as opposed to executives who just sit and approve shit.

Exactly. Gotta love the knee-jerk, I can't have a logical thought because I'm just so ready to rant about "the man" bullshit. Especially since it sounds like it's coming from someone who doesn't even use or understand the service.

Dropbox is file storage, plain and simple. I use it to make a few music files and some reading material available across my devices. That's it's main function, to store/share files.

All that other shit he is talking about that encryption won't work with is all fluff and ancillary stuff - I name my files properly, for example, so I don't need them to search within them for me. The service works just fine with encrypted files - you just can't use the fancy doodads that you don't really need anyway.

I applaud him for being honest - if this was certain other companies they'd be telling you "oh trust us. It's secure!" He's being honest - it's a dumping spot for files, if you want encryption, BYO.

Christ some of the folks around these parts don't know their heads from their asses - use the words encryption or privacy and they don't even listen or understand wtf is being talked about they just automatically jump to tired fear mongering rhetoric. Just like the folks who take rifles strapped across their backs to Starbucks - I want to say, WTF are you so scared of? And if you do have something to be scared of - stay the fuck home, or in this case, don't be a complete retard and use a "cloud" service to begin with.