Seems that facial recognition system being tested in San Francisco bars wasn’t terribly popular. Seems, at least this time around, that the free market wins.
Several San Francisco bars that originally agreed to partner with SceneTap said that they have pulled out, largely due to negative media attention and potential privacy concerns.
Sunday, May 20, 2012
To me this is so simple; if the iPad really is as successful as Apple claims, and if the company is so damn innovative that it has ideas for decades, why are they continuously trying to beat down the competition on things like, “it looks similar to our product!”?
Keep in mind, also, that Apple has been caught lying to the court on multiple occasions in this case, even been reprimanded for the frivolity of their ongoing lawsuits.
If Apple’s motion succeeds, there will then be a US ban in place against three major Android device makers. Last December, the US International Trade Commission (ITC) banned specific HTC products based on an Apple patent and this past Friday, the ITC banned some Motorola devices based on a Microsoft patent. Seems like litigation is the new weapon of choice in this war of supremacy.
http://www.cultofmac.com/168231/once-more-unto-the-breach-apple-files-for-another-galaxy-tab-ban/
Sunday, May 20, 2012
For starters, have a look at what’s at heart of this lawsuit:
The copyright phase ended last week with the jury convicting Google on one of three counts, namely infringement of nine lines of Java code known as rangeCheck. In a separate issue, the jury couldn’t agree on the question of whether Google’s use of the Java API was a so-called fair use, and thus allowable under copyright law. That question went to the judge, who hasn’t decided yet.
I don’t do much work with Java but I believe that the rangeCheck function is a very simple way to check to see if a value exists in a series of values in memory (an array). The fact that it’s only 9 lines of code would certainly indicate this (it’s probably all I would need).
The bigger point, however, is that companies like Oracle would be willing to sue over something so elemental and simple over which they claim copyright. Consider that police forces act as, essentially, private copyright/patent enforcers — but only for the big corporations (try selling a Prada bag or pirated Microsoft software on a street corner to see what I mean). If it’s you or me that needs intellectual property protection, the cops certainly won’t be going out and arresting anyone, and sure as hell not autonomously patrolling the streets on our behalf.
So companies like Oracle can lay claim over basically anything (exactly like in this example), and because it’s Oracle, you can expect the cops to come beating down your door and slapping cuffs on you. Oh sure, the courts might eventually rule in your favour, but at that point you’ll be financially ruined, you’ll have no home, etc. etc,
This is precisely why copyright and patents laws stifle innovation and entrepreneurship, not promote it.
Sunday, May 20, 2012
Kinda geeky since it doesn’t exist as a product yet, but it signifies a shift to solid state memory, or memory with no moving parts. That means no more spinning hard drives, which should equal much longer-lasting computers (it’s usually the hard drive that fails first on most PCs because it’s constantly in motion). Of course, I’m sure they’ll find some other way to obsolete your hardware and keep you buying.
Researchers at University College London have used this technology to make a chip that operates at 100 times the speed of standard Flash memory. The device is composed completely of silicon oxide, which improves the chip’s resistance, and it doesn’t require a vacuum to work (which makes it cheaper to produce). But this new chip is more than just a faster alternative to Flash; its ability to move between different states of conductivity means it can be configured as a memristor, or a device that handles both data-processing and storage tasks.
http://m.engadget.com/default/article.do?artUrl=http://www.engadget.com/2012/05/20/researchers-develop-silicon-reram-chip
Sunday, May 20, 2012
The only condition being that Android stays open source and free for five years. After that, they can become another Apple.
Google announced their plans to acquire Motorola last year and regulators in both the US and Europe approved the acquisition in February. According to a Reuters report, the main condition of the deal is that Android OS stays free and open for five years.
http://arstechnica.com/gadgets/2012/05/chinese-authorities-approve-googles-acquisition-of-motorola/
Sunday, May 20, 2012
…low Chinese wages are low because the Chinese economy as a whole is a low-productivity economy. So whoever is to blame for low wages at Foxconn (and therefore, by implication for Apple products) is whoever stopped China developing into a high-productivity economy over the last century or so. I would identify that person as being Mao Tse Tung myself but we can blame just the general idiocy of communism if you’d prefer.
…assuming you buy this argument (China is “low-productivity”?), who’s responsible for maintaining those same low wages today? Certainly it couldn’t have anything to do with record-breaking-profiteer Apple, could it?
http://www.forbes.com/sites/timworstall/2012/05/17/why-wages-at-apples-foxconn-are-so-low/
Sunday, May 20, 2012
Unfortunately, it’s a measly $1.2 million fine (set last year), for not obeying European law that stipulate consumers get a 2-year warranty instead of getting them to sign up to the AppleCare Protection Plan. What this demonstrates (how many times is this now?) is Apple’s abject refusal to follow laws, especially those that would protect their own customers, and to abide by them and even relatively tiny fines if they think that they can make just one more sliver of profit.
The Regional Administrative Tribunal (TAR) of Lazio rejected Apple’s appeal against the fine imposed by the Antitrust Authority last December for “unfair commercial practices that damage the consumer.”
The court found that Apple Italy was not fully applying a two-year guarantee that is obligatory under European law and was providing unclear information on its own additional commercial warranties, the online edition of the Corriere della Sera newspaper reported.
The Antitrust fine applies to Apple Sales International, Apple Italia, and Apple Retail Italia and concerns their alleged failure to inform customers of their right to a 24-month warranty from the vendor under European Union regulations and insufficiently clear information on the company’s own AppleCare Protection Plan and its partial duplication of the existing legal warranties.
Note how the mainstream maintains that this is “alleged” infraction even though the ruling has already been made — and upheld! I guess Paul Bernardo is an “alleged” murderer too.
http://www.pcworld.com/article/255851/italian_court_upholds_apple_warranty_fine.html
Sunday, May 20, 2012
I’ve written about how Apple benefits absolutely no one but themselves I don’t know how many times now. I’ve also mentioned the secrecy and underhanded tactics Apple uses to get its retail locations.
And now I’ve learned that cities are so hot to get in bed with this company that they’re dropping (or often eliminating), rent and offering it other incentives to move in. How fucked up is that? The company that’s making money hand over fist gets to pay no rent because the city believes it’s going to be a hit? Pure, unadulterated Apple logic — people are going to come to an Apple store to spend money and so, despite all evidence to the contrary, this will benefit everyone!
New York’s Grand Central Terminal wanted Apple so bad it dropped its leasing fees and in Salt Lake City, authorities are rumoured to have dropped rents completely, to incentivise the opening of a new Apple Store.
…
A recent ABC News report states that Apple is going to open a new store in Salt Lake City, located in City Creek. The company already has one store in the the Utah city but thanks to what appears to be a massive retail incentive, it may open a new store before the end of the year.
What is the big incentive? According to ABC’s sources, City Creek has offered a “major concession package” that is thought to include five years free rent.
Sunday, May 20, 2012
It’s not a verdict, but it demonstrates that the judge believes there’s definitely enough evidence for the eBook price-fixing scandal to go to court. To put it another way, ”it is presumed that the conduct by all parties would be unlawful under the rule of reason.”
Some more indicative quotes from presiding Judge Cote include:
“It has everything to do with co-ordinating a horizontal agreement among publishers to raise prices, and eliminating horizontal price competition among Apple’s competitors at the retail level.”
“With the fortuitous entry of Apple into the market for e-books, and the decision by Apple to join the price-fixing conspiracy, that horizontal conspiracy became a potent weapon for engineering a fundamental shift in an entire industry.”
This is the type of shift that Apple is predominantly responsible for — not innovation, not improvement, not forward thinking or creativity, no matter what all the fool hipsters maintain. And this is a clear-cut example of exactly why those hipsters are fools; you’d have to be to continue to ignore how this scummy, underhanded company really operates and what it really produces — a repressive monopoly of shoddy, inferior products that are backed by nothing more than haughty advertising claims and straight up lies.
Think different? Yeah, why not actually try that?
http://www.reuters.com/article/2012/05/15/apple-ebooks-idUSL1E8GFA6M20120515
Sunday, May 20, 2012
Most people are not aware of it, and the plethora of patent litigation might not suggest it, but Samsung is a fairly major supplied of iPhone parts. It’s estimated that 25% of any given iPhone is actually Samsung hardware, so you’d think Samsung’s profits would also be helped by Apple’s financial success. Right? Like the mobile carriers who signed up to carry the iPhone? Or the suppliers putting the phones together? Or the third-party software developers writing the software for them? Maybe the retailers that sell Apple products?
Of course not!
At this point you should’ve realized that Apple gets its profits at literally everyone’s expense, including yours, even if you never buy an Apple product.
Investors are discounting Samsung too much. The company’s should grow by 62 per cent in 2012, according to consensus forecasts, yet after this week’s decline, the shares trade at just 8.2 times projected 2012 earnings. That’s below Apple, and other peers like LG Electronics and SK Hynix.
Sunday, May 20, 2012
The scam is pretty simple: artificially inflate the price of a hot stock (having first bought a whole bunch yourself before anyone else had a chance), and get all the suckers to buy in, then dump the thing like a hot potato and make off with the cash. When the dust settles, if you’re still holding the stock you’ll have paid way more than it’ll ever be worth.
Don’t say you haven’t been warned!
And guess who’s running the game?
Basically, what we hear is that the underwriters including Morgan Stanley, JPMorgan and Goldman Sachs, got too pushy in the final days before the IPO about pricing. Earlier this month, the company was slated to open at a $28 to 35 price range, but that range was pushed up to $34 to 38 a share. Then Facebook priced at the very high end at $38 last night.
“The only thing keeping it at $38 are support mechanisms,” a source tells us. “There just wasn’t the institutional investor demand that people thought there would be.”
Saturday, May 19, 2012
If you gaze upwards in any major metropolis today, you’ll realize that this incredible invasion of privacy is widespread. Seems no one really cares, or cares where it’s all heading.
The cameras, which are mounted above the door of their client bars, scan patrons’ faces as they enter and exit the bar. The company’s software then immediately determines whether the person is male or female, and counts how many of each are in the bar, divides that by the known capacity of the bar, and then outputs something like: “Crowd: >90% full | Women: 58% | Men: 42%.” San Francisco bar patrons are unlikely to know that their faces are being scanned, however—the company has only put SceneTap stickers in the windows, but does not explain to customers in an obvious way what exactly is going on.
http://arstechnica.com/business/2012/05/scenetap-poised-to-creep-out-san-francisco-bar-patrons/
Saturday, May 19, 2012
This one is in Russia, showing the creeping influence of the recording industry Gestapo. This claim centers around mass copyright infringement claims through file sharing, the majority of which I’m sure are completely unproven. http://paidcontent.org/2012/05/18/vkontaktecopyright/
Saturday, May 19, 2012
You may remember Apple (and others, to be fair), claiming that although low-paid work like assembly and parts production was being done in places like China, skilled jobs (not to mention trade secrets), would be kept at home. Surprise! They’re lying through their teeth. See you in hell, America. Your banks have fucked you over and your corporations are finishing the job. And now that we have more than one generation that can’t fend for itself, I’m sure that the future is just peachy.
http://www.macrumors.com/2012/05/18/apple-in-talks-to-open-rd-facility-in-russias-skolkovo-innovation-centre/
Saturday, May 19, 2012
That’s despite the fact that Google itself admitted it turned to “U.S. authorities,” which obviously includes the NSA, after the search giant’s Chinese operation was deeply hacked. Former NSA chief Mike McConnell told the Washington Post that collaboration between the NSA and private companies like Google was “inevitable.”
http://m.wired.com/threatlevel/2012/05/google-nsa-secrecy-upheld/
Thursday, May 17, 2012
This is, second Euro country to have non-elected members simply put into power by the banks (for the second time, no less). Third if you count France (Italy being the second). Yup, just simply ignore the will of the people; here’s your new banker overlords!
Ironic considering this is supposed to be the place of democracy. More ironic that these jack-asses were in power when the countries’ economies went to shit. No doubt one of the big banks (probably JPMorgan), is directly behind this. Again.
But why vote for leaders when “technocratic” dictators can simply be appointed over a nation by a bank that continues to rob the world blind? I mean, what’s wrong with that?
George Zannias, who has served as chief economist at the finance ministry since the start of the Greek crisis, was sworn in as finance minister, bringing a welcome element of continuity to the country’s economic management. In his previous position, Zannias was deeply involved in negotiations for Greece’s two separate bailouts, including a EUR130 billion package agreed in March, as well as related debt restructuring. Among other technocrats, Yannis Stournaras–a prominent and widely respected local economist–was sworn in to the position of development minister, and career diplomat Petros Molyviatis as foreign minister.
http://online.wsj.com/article/BT-CO-20120517-704086.html
Thursday, May 17, 2012
… again I ask what prevents the police from destroying an innocent man’s life like this in the future? What good is a flacid recognition of injustice after the fact?
http://www.torontocitylife.com/2012/05/16/byron-sonne-freed-all-charges-dropped/
Wednesday, May 16, 2012
What a koinkeedink! I guess if they can’t censor the web one way, they’ll do it another way. I wonder what other “enemies of America” are being targeted today.
WikiLeaks has been under sustained DDOS attacks over the last 72 hours. http://www.wikileaks.org is good, http://wikileaks.org is flooded.
http://m.zdnet.com/blog/security/wikileaks-has-been-under-ddos-attack-for-the-last-three-days/12219
Wednesday, May 16, 2012
Looks like los federales play the dirty takedown game too. Wonder how many zombie computers were used, and if the attack source will ever be tracked down.
The attack comes after ISPs in the U.K. and the Netherlands were ordered to block access to The Pirate Bay over copyright violations. In retaliation, the hacking group Anonymous struck out at Virgin Media, one of the U.K. ISPs ordered to block to the site, prompting The Pirate Bay to equate the move to censorship.
http://www.pcmag.com/article2/0,2817,2404504,00.asp
Wednesday, May 16, 2012
The media seems hell bent on demonizing this guy by continually calling him an activist, referring to “explosive chemicals” (hair bleach, for example —all perfectly legal), “weapons” (a potato shooter), and really the only charge this is all based on, “inciting mischief not committed” (openly discussing about how the G20 security fence might be breached — but not actually doing it or planning to do it). To anyone paying attention, it’s obvious that the cops are trying to intimidate him, and in effect you, from even thinking the wrong thoughts when they tell you to grovel like a dog before them. This case is a travesty and should never have been allowed in court. Read more at http://www.torontocitylife.com/2012/05/15/byron-sonnes-verdict-expected-today/
Tuesday, May 15, 2012