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Comment Re:Nope. (Score 1) 150

Not to mention that the volume "shortfall" wasn't caused by poor sales or high prices. It was cause by the previous financial year's quarter being one week longer than this year's quarter. The weekly average actually increased.

And there will be no corrections, clarifications, or retractions because the tech press is completely beyond accountability.

Comment Re:Blame Javascript (Score 1) 128

I need to dig into the Twitter app, at 121.1 MB on my iPhone 6 Plus, to see how it ended up that much larger than Twitterrific at 11.4 MB. I'm guessing it's because The Iconfactory, as Mac development veterans, wrote Twitterrific in straight Objective-C code, while Twitter is using something like React. (I think Tweetbot is even smaller than Twitterrific, but that's probably because Tweetbot doesn't come with any iMessage stickers.)

Comment Re:"...disabled by default." (Score 5, Interesting) 307

The exact same thing was said when Apple introduced Gatekeeper in mac OS Mountain Lion four years ago. The default when Mountain Lion* shipped was to allow apps from the App Store or signed apps from other sources, and it's still the default today. The blanket option to allow all apps and go unprotected is now hidden, but it can be re-enabled from the command line. And you can still override Gatekeeper for individual apps from at least three different interfaces (attempt to launch the app, then open the App Store prefpane; right-click the app in Finder; use spctl from the command line). As far as I'm concerned, that's all as it should be. It's still possible for a user to selectively bypass Gatekeeper, but it's harder to do so accidentally or globally.

(*: The back-port to Lion allowed all apps by default as a concession to users of old hardware that were left behind when Mountain Lion dropped support for 32-bit EFI.)

That's no guarantee that Microsoft will be as wise as Apple has been. Instead of code signing, Microsoft is encouraging developers to wrap Win32 apps in UWP containers so they can be published from the Windows Store, so probably not as wise. Closed-source OS developers aren't idiots, though. Apple and Microsoft both know that the "default walled garden on desktop" button is wired to the self-destruct system.

Comment Three Bears Heating & Air Conditioning (Score 2) 216

Much of our building is converted warehouse space, so the HVAC is rather patchwork. On any given day, regardless of the season, one part of the building will be too hot, one will be too cold, and one will be just right. You won't know what the conditions will be in your part of the building, however, until you get to the office.
Earth

Apple: Greenpeace's Cloud Critique Driven By Bogus Numbers 188

miller60 writes "Apple says Greenpeace has wildly overestimated the amount of power it uses in its data center in North Carolina, and used that bad math to give the company a low grade on sustainability. Apple says it uses 20 megawatts of power at its iDataCenter, a fraction of Greenpeace's estimate of 100 megawatts in a new report on energy use by cloud computing providers. Apple says that its huge solar array and biogas-powered fuel cell will supply 60 percent of the facility's power, not the 10 percent claimed by Greenpeace."

Comment Re:Few to admit it, but a lot of parents teach thi (Score 1) 1208

Now let's say that athlete tweets something extremely offensive to thousands of people. Is that sports organization not supposed to punish the athlete for his/her comments? Should brands continue endorsing?

This is exactly what happened to Pittsburgh Steelers running back Rashard Mendenhall. In the days following Osama bin Laden's death, Mendenhall tweeted some misbegotten thoughts that could be interpreted as sympathetic to bin Laden (personally, not as leader of al Qaeda). He tried to explain himself, but just dug the hole deeper, until Champion dropped him as an endorser. The Steelers tend to keep their discipline for stuff like this out of the papers, but it's worth mentioning that Mendenhall hasn't tweeted since last season's training camp started.

Comment Missing Options out the wazoo (Score 1) 639

Anarchist reactionary running dog revisionist
Hindu Muslim Catholic
Creation evolutionist
Rational romantic mystic
Cynical idealist
Minimal expressionist
Post-modern neo-symbolist
Armchair rocket scientist
Graffiti existentialist
Deconstruction primitive performance photo-realist
Be-bop or a one drop or a hip-hop lite pop metallist
Gold adult contemporary urban country capitalist

Comment Whatever happened to my Double X bumper sticker? (Score 2) 92

Don't Let's Start was not perceived as a standout track to us or really anyone in our audience until many months after the album was out. A Pittsburgh radio station started playing it like it was a hit song, and that really turned it into something else.

We keep hearing echoes of WXXP in Pittsburgh, even after all these years. That was the most daring rock playlist in the city in the late '80s, but without all the WTF-ishness of WRCT. We'll never see its like again, though, especially with Clear Channel and CBS dominating the market.

Input Devices

USB Foot Controls 123

MojoKid writes "When it comes to controlling your favorite PC title, you've got a few options. There's a mouse. There's a keyboard. There's a control pad and the joystick. Now, there's one more option apparently. Keith McMillen Instruments (KMI) announced today the SoftStep KeyWorx multi-touch foot controller, the world's first foot controlled digital interface. Available for Mac and Windows, this controller sits on the floor. The company claims that it has multiple uses for gamers, video editors, programmers, data entry professionals, disabled people, repetitive stress syndrome sufferers, etc. It's both pressure and location sensitive, USB-powered, and contains ten fully customizable keys that remember up to 100 sets of commands for repetitive tasks."

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