True they may not have been the first, but they usually deliver the most polished and relevant version of whatever they are doing.

Then again, Microsoft kinda throws their tech (which is usually more conceptual than a fully realized product) at everything in hopes something might stick. Usually it doesn't work in their favor though.

Oh, that might be the EEPROM problem that older Vizios flat screens have turns out there's an EEPROM on the board that locks after so many boot ups (counter overflows or something) you have to replace it to get the TV working again - Bought a non-functioning (non-smart ) 32" Vizio TV at a rummage sale that had that problem. the new eeprom fixed it up.

We have a Vizio, (liked it because it wasn't some roku or Amazon Fire box) after a few months the quality of the set started going downhill (remote updates don't ya love em) we had been enjoying the their built-in free play channel WatchFree was nice and simple interface compared to Pluto.TV and didn't overwhelm the TVs little processor... but soon they got greedy and made WatchFree+ which likely pushed more data gathering or advertising, had a lousier UI, stored too much on favorites for my TV's processor to remember, and chewed up more bandwidth with massive preview images. For about a year or so they (Vizio)kept on trying to switch users from WatchFree to WatchFree+ (changed default watchfree button to watchfree+, re-positioned in the apps menu, etc.) They finally deleted Watchfree entirely. Which promoted my to switch to PlutoTV streaming as WatchFree+ is just unusable.

Recently about a year ago they pushed another update that changed the TV's "tuner" option into the WatchFree+ app (now you can't just show whats on ch3 but now it filters it through the WatchFree+ app player with boxed 4:3 aspect ratio. and who knows what else)

Who knows what Wal-Mart will do to it to recoup their investment..

I once was on a tough programming problem that vexed me most of the day and at night I had a dream/nightmare where I was trying to solve it only to come up with the same lame solution over and over and over again. Have you ever dreamnt of some awesome song song never heard before and were able to remember the lyrics and realize once awake it was not really that good? (actually pretty bad)

Dreaming is the generative AI of the brain.

"..deals with the resurrection of the dead. Long distance electrodes shot into the pineal and pituitary glands of recent dead. Have you attempted any of this plan as yet?"

I guess they have.

Many orgs probably don't know it when it comes from some WordPress Plugin or other module...

Or two "friends" encircled by the "embracing" hug of a much larger third "friend"

Been working on a similar community directory for a few years now, though it's for a smaller region: https://ancillary-proxy.atarimworker.io?url=https%3A%2F%2Fdoplaces.com%2F Looks like what I had when I launched doPlaces in 2013.

Can't say much more about it as I haven't been doing much marketing for it (I'm more a tool creator), mainly to see it I could do the local community directories one better (wasn''t hard.) I must say it is definitely convenient to pull up a places hours and then quickly get to website/facebook to verify while on the road (as a passenger of course). Due to COVID most every listing hours (and whether they are still in operation) is probably out of date.

I think society all did the digital transformation way too quick, there's a lot of paper information "wheels" that still need some digital re-inventing.

I hope to see down the road where Walmart is caught in some wage theft case and the worker's lawyers request for the phone telemetries to prove the worked hours (or schedule) were more than the reimbursed, then the managers get the hot seat and see how that pans out. Also other things could be found out like proving racial or gender bias from work history patterns, gaming employee hours to cut full time, etc. That part would be informative.

Instead of listing the dollar abount lets talk about the actuall things they develop. Seen way too many companies that are nowhere near #1 saying "Wel'll invest a thousand times more than that and dominate the market." only to silently fall back into obscurity when they fail to deliver on that statement.

Snce we have a Kyocera printer we are greatly affected. Even if we are able to get the printer to work other apps may exhibit probems. Got a similar error after the update when starting Powerpoint on one machine. The best solution is to uninstall (or keep uninstalling as it keeps updating, thanks Microsoft!) the problematic updates, it is the only workable solution presently.

Watched one recently "History of Silicon Valley" on Prime, it was computer generated narration reading some essay on SV history with a bunch of contemporary computer/tech stock footage (person using a laptop, etc.) Now they are charging to "rent it".

They are probably getting dumped with questionable documentaries.

Old customer to AT&T "Hey you raised my rates you S&%&!"

AT&T, "Sorry, that's not our problem."

Customer to buyer "Hey my rates are highter for the same S^&*^& service!"

Ne Company, "Yeah, wasn't us though, that was AT&T, don't forget to pay your bill."

Microsoft Teams with [insert name here] usually doesnt end all that well for the partner company - good luck there Space-X.

Reminds me of this cartoon segment -
https://ancillary-proxy.atarimworker.io?url=https%3A%2F%2Fyoutu.be%2FVEQILKohuY0%3Ft...

There was probably similar stuff going on in the 1918 pandemic.