Tuesday, December 20, 2011

Patents and rants.

The color brown is a trademark UPS.  Seeds are been patented; mind you the food is in greater quanity, for less nutrition and no taste - but greater quanity didn't stop price rises.  The wars been on for years, and it's all about patents and such.  Early in December Motorola got a ban on iPhone and iPad sales in Europe (motorola-secures-europe-wide-sales-ban-on-iphone-ipad).  Now Apple has secured a ban on HTC Android phone sales in the US (apple-gets-us-ban-on-htc-android-phones-sales-for-now).  Not sure what I'm saying, but who's working on patenting air, and are they going to go to court against the patent holders of oxygen and nitrogen.  Benyilin came out with new cough syrup, well new tag line and packaging anyway, the identical medication, same size in old box was $7.00 less.  At least the ice cream guys are being ecological, putting 1.89 L of product in the 2 L containers they no doubt still have several million of.  And Shaw says "what does 100 MB/s mean to you?" - fine print "up to" - up to = about 10 MB/s.  In Canada we also get the 3 year cell contracts, of course for phones the manufacturers expect us to replace at least every other year.  Why do the buy right out cell phones not go on sale;  all the box stores have agreements with carriers.  Agreement here, agreement there, patent this patent that, it all just cost the consumer.  And why are the banks trying to go all electronic when major breaches are endless; some eletronic yes, but there not ready to look after our money as we've already seen.
Blah blah blah, hope that's not patented by Ke$ha, her name is probably patented?!? ;D
Have a great day and Merry Christmas to all celebraters, happy holidays to the rest.


Tuesday, November 15, 2011

Android & Unwanted Apps/App Updates with heightened permissions

Preinstalled updates such as Netflix's and Facebook are requesting updates with significant changes in premissions. I don't use these and am not going to give access that isn't necessary for the apps anyway; alot of data mining going on. There NEEDS to be a way to ignore updates from built in apps. Really, does Netflix's need to read my personal contact data, I think not. Internet access sure, but some of the permissions apps are asking for nowadays, especially olds ones getting updated, are above and beyond need. If Google can't contol this, savvy users are going to move to other platforms. If Google is never going to have a block update option, let us know and we can all root our devices and send our anger towards the manufactuers loading up crap-ware on our devices. Very frustrating :(

Sunday, October 9, 2011

An Irish man went to confession ......... (more WEB humour)

An Irish man went to confession in St. Patrick Catholic Church. 'Father', he confessed, 'it has been one month since my last confession. I had sex with Nookie Green twice last month.'
The priest told the sinner, 'You are forgiven. Go out and say three Hail Mary's.'
Soon thereafter, another Irish man entered the confessional. 'Father, it has been two months since my last confession. I've had sex with Nookie Green twice a week for the past two months.'
This time, the priest questioned, 'Who is this Nookie Green?'
'A new woman in the neighborhood,' the sinner replied.
'Very well,' sighed the priest. Go and say ten Hail Mary's.
At mass that Sunday morning, as the priest prepared to deliver the sermon, a tall, voluptuous, drop-dead gorgeous redheaded woman entered the sanctuary. The eyes of every man in the church fell upon her as she slowly sashayed up the aisle and sat down right in front of the priest. Her dress was green and very short, and she wore matching, shiny emerald-green shoes.
The priest and the altar boy gasped as the woman in the green dress and matching green shoes sat with her legs spread slightly apart, but just enough to realize she wasn't wearing any underwear.
The priest turned to the altar boy and whispered, 'Is that Nookie Green?'
The bug-eyed altar boy couldn't believe his ears but managed to calmly reply, 'No Father, I think it's just a reflection from her shoes'...........

Friday, September 23, 2011

Little Johnny Joke


Over the X-mas holidays Little Johnny went to visit his Grandparents while Mom & Dad got some much needed rest.
Everything was going well until one day when the snow turned into a blizzard. Little Johnny was kept in and started to get into trouble, so his Grandma decided he should help her bake some cookies. Pandering to his sweet-tooth, he agreed and for a while things were peaceful.
Always curious, Little Johnny asked, "Gramma, how old are you?"
She looked at him and replied, "We don't talk about things like that Johnny," and went back to rolling out the dough.
A few minutes later Little Johnny asked, "Gramma, how much do you weigh?"
She stopped cutting out cookie blanks and in an almost harsh tone said, "Now Johnny, I told you that we don't talk about things like that."
Disappointed Johnny waited until they put the first cookie sheet into the over and then asked, "Gramma, why does Gran-pa sleep on the couch every night?"
In an almost scolding tone she snapped, "Johnny, we REALLY don't talk about that."
Little Johnny went into the living room where his Grandpa was watching TV, crawled up in his lap and said, "Gran-pa, Gramma won't tell me nuttin'."
"What won't she tell you Johnny?"
"I ask'd her how old she was, and how much she weighed, and why you sleep on the couch?" replied his favorite Grandson.
Thinking about it while they watched TV together, the older man told him, "Johnny, over there on the table is your Grandmother's purse. In the side pocket is her Driver's License and that will tell you everything you need to know." Johnny jumped down, ran over to the purse and got out the plastic card. It took him a few minutes but he read every word. All excited now, he ran back into the kitchen where his Grandmother was pulling the first batch of cookies out of the oven. Jumping up and down with excitement he exclaimed, "Gramma, Gramma, it says right here that you're 68 years old, an' you weigh 240 pounds and it also says right here why Gran-pa sleeps on the couch!"
Shocked, she just looked at her Grandson as he proudly told her, "Yea Gramma, it say right here that you got an "F" in sex.
ALSO: Check out the new animated - Little Johnny: The Movie (2011) - pretty hilarious those Aussie's are!!!



Monday, September 19, 2011

Found on the WEB - LOL

The Newfies have solved their own fuel problems
They imported 50 million tonnes of sand from the Arabs and they're going to drill for their own oil.

**********

Me buddy’s missus left him last Thursday, she said she was going out for a pint of milk and never came back!
I asked him how he was coping and he said,
"Not bad, I've been using that powdered stuff."

**********

Newfoundlanders find a mirror in the road. The first one picks it up and says, "Lard Jasus, I knows this face but I can't put a name to it."
The second picks it up and says, "You stupid bastard, it's me!"

**********

Saturday, September 17, 2011

Found on the Web - Another good reason to be retired - time to make up stories.

MY LAST TRIP TO COSTCO

Yesterday I was at my local COSTCO buying a large bag of Purina dog chow for my sons dog, LUX, and was in the check-out line when a woman behind me asked if I had a dog.

What did she think, I had an elephant?

So since I'm retired and have little to do, on impulse I told her that no, I didn't have a dog, I was starting the Purina Diet again. I added that I probably shouldn't, because I ended up in the hospital last time, but that I'd lost 50 pounds before I awakened in an intensive care ward with tubes coming out of most of my orifices and IVs in both arms.
I told her that it was essentially a Perfect Diet and that the way that it works is, to load your pants pockets with Purina Nuggets and simply eat one or two every time you feel hungry. The food is nutritionally complete so it works well and I was going to try it again. (I have to mention here that practically everyone in line was now enthralled with my story.)

Horrified, she asked if I ended up in intensive care, because the dog food poisoned me. I told her no, I stepped off a curb to sniff a poodle's ass and a car hit me.

I thought the guy behind her was going to have a heart attack he was laughing so hard.

Costco won't let me shop there anymore.

Better watch what you ask retired people. They have all the time in the world to think of crazy things to say and email.

Sunday, June 12, 2011

Honeycomb 3.1, Asus EEE Transformer, & Apps

Found some great apps that run very well on Honeycomb.  My favorite is Pulse, a news reader.

Trial Xtreme is a great dirt bike game, only downside is it requires a connection to run.  Not sure why it's Trial and not Trail, maybe looking for more search hits, but it is a paid trail bike game.

And 80% of my phone apps scaled up beautifully from 3.2" to 10.1"; with more apps coming there's no good reason to not choose an Android tablet unless your still a seed stuck in the core of Apple. The Asus EEE Pad Transformer is a great Honeycomb 3.1 tablet.
The Angry Birds versions all scale fine as does DoggCatcher.



Saturday, June 11, 2011

WTF Asus, Safari, Adobe Flash, Firefox (for mobile)

This is so Spockish.  Asus EEE Transformer is now updated to Honeycomb 3.1, when I got it it was 3.0.1, the market flash was 10.3 at the time so to get flash I had to track down flash 10.2; 10.3 won't install on 3.0.1.   To get Honeycomb 3.1 to install I needed to factory reset the EEE Pad; with 3.1 flash 10.3 was installable from market.  Figured I'd grab Firefox too.  This is where it gets completely illogical; the built in browser is Safari (Apple) and running Safari on Honeycomb 3.1 with flash 10.3 plays flash video; Firefox will not play Flash on my Honeycomb 3.1 Android tablet.  Firefox offers a partial workaround but even that is external to Firefox.  Safari is pretty sucky as a browser on most platforms but on Google's Android it works alright; so sad for the iPad crowd that is still without flash. 
The worst browser in the world goes to Sony's PlayStation 3; "do you want to install the plugin", and extremely minimal video support.  My first computer was an Apple IIe and I played many hours of Jumpman on my black and green screen and wrote papers that required swapping in and out multiple 5.25" floppies; you'd get about 20 pages of a formatted document on 1 floppy.  Since Steve left and returned I left, only I have no desire to return to the Apple.  I lived through Windows 3.11, 95, 98, XP, Vista, & now Windows 7 which is a great OS. 
Firefox I need flash support in the browser; if I set Firefox as default App Market videos aren't even clickable.  This is a great product, the Asus EEE Pad Transformer and although the "about battery" view usage is still in limbo, the battery life I've experienced is as good or better than Asus's claim; but how did Apple's Safari creep onto my Android - it seems there is no way to escape Master Jobs.

By the way, there are enough Honeycomb apps available, and more coming soon; need GameHouse to resize NCIS, could probably actually play on a tablet but after full size credits play and settings are chosen the screen shrinks to phone size.  Found other full screen games.  Wish we Canadians could get in on the Amazon deal but it is not available in the north.  At least Shaw is giving us unlimited internet, hope the twit's get it down south.

Friday, June 10, 2011

Internet is still alive in Canada

Shaw cable has restored the 150GB striped earlier this year and allows 500GB once again on my plan.  Even better they now have 2 unlimited plans available.  Good on Shaw, I may even give Netflix a try now.  Now we need some unlimited cell plans for tablets and smart phones.

Saturday, May 14, 2011

ETS LRT scheduling. Is it rapid transit.

What insanity, the LRT may be early and you'll miss it, or it will be late and you'll miss your connection.  The help you'll get when reporting issues is simply a reiterating of the schedule they can't keep.  If ETS can't keep a train on schedule I doubt buses will ever be scheduled properly.  Pay more for lesser service, way to go ETS.  Got to platform at 11:17PM its 11:40 and two trains have gone by the other way, I guess 15 minute service takes ETS a little longer to achieve.  The schedule says 11:26 & 11:41,.holy shit its !1:43, 26 minutes and 3 trains heading other way.

Next day at train 11:37PM, scheduled for 11:41, 11:45 now ... guess train is off schedule another day... EVERYDAY.

How can they claim it's rapid transit.  I'll be mising my connection again, can I use Mandel's EXPO logic and take a cab and send the bill to the city.

Thursday, May 5, 2011

PS3 - Playstation

77,000,000 million users... Sony's sorry, but it happens to everyone, so they say.
Text below edited from SN298 show notes.
Sony PlayStation Network, had a compromise.  They posted an FAQ, a Frequently Asked Questions.  And I'm going to quote from two questions.
Question #6, they're asking themselves, "Does that mean all users' information was compromised?  Tell us more details of what personal information leaked.And the response is:  "In terms of possibility, yes.  We believe that an unauthorized person" - this is Sony speaking - "an unauthorized person has obtained the following information that you provided:  name, address (city, state/province, zip or postal code), country, email address, birth date, PlayStation Network password, login, password security answers, and handle/PSN online ID.  It is also possible that your profile data may have been obtained, including purchase history and billing address (city, state/province, zip or postal code).  If you have authorized a sub-account for your dependent, the same data with respect to your dependent may have been obtained.  If you have provided your credit card data through PlayStation Network or" - what is this, Qriocity, I guess, is their audio.
It's related.  "So it is possible" - continuing from Sony - "that your credit card number and expiration date may also have been obtained." 
And then Question #9 is:  "I want to know if my account has been affected."
Sony says, "To protect against possible identity theft or other financial loss" - love that opening - "we encourage you to remain vigilant to review your account statements and to monitor your credit reports.  Additionally, if you use the same username or password for your PlayStation Network or Qriocity service account for other unrelated services or accounts" - elsewhere on the Internet, they mean - "we strongly recommend that you change them.  When the PlayStation Network and Qriocity services are back on line, we also strongly recommend that you log on to change your password" at that time.
Steve: Yeah.  Sony says, "To protect against possible identity theft or other financial loss" - love that opening - "we encourage you to remain vigilant..."
Leo: [Laughing] Unlike us, apparently.Steve: Yeah, we haven't, but we want you to.
Leo: So now you have to.Steve: "...to review your account statements and to monitor your credit reports.  Additionally, if you use the same username or password for your PlayStation Network or Qriocity service account for other unrelated services or accounts" - elsewhere on the Internet, they mean - "we strongly recommend that you change them.  When the PlayStation Network and Qriocity services are back on line, we also strongly recommend that you log on to change your password" at that time.
Steve: Yeah.  Sony says, "To protect against possible identity theft or other financial loss" - love that opening - "we encourage you to remain vigilant..."
Leo: [Laughing] Unlike us, apparently.Steve: Yeah, we haven't, but we want you to.
Leo: So now you have to.Steve: "...to review your account statements and to monitor your credit reports.  Additionally, if you use the same username or password for your PlayStation Network or Qriocity service account for other unrelated services or accounts" - elsewhere on the Internet, they mean - "we strongly recommend that you change them.  When the PlayStation Network and Qriocity services are back on line, we also strongly recommend that you log on to change your password" at that time.
End edit from SN298 notes.

So the network is still offline on May 4 2011, been down over a week, even so a few days ago I got the PSN newsletter trying to sell stuff with no mention of the network issues.
Sony will now spend more on lawyers than they ever did on security.
Update: credit card data also stolen.
So Sony locks down the PS3, and movies with Cinavia; I saw Social Network in the theater, bought the blu-ray, Sony's Cinavia won't let me make a back up.  You can't count on Sony to protect your info and Sony won't let you protect yourself.  So Sony has locked down their stuff, or tried to, all the while ignoring locking down customers stuff. As a side note, while Sony has done many updates on the PS3 the browser still remains the worst you can find "Do you want to install the plug-in" - users will know what I mean.

Wednesday, May 4, 2011

RE: Can't connect Legend as disc drive after Froyo update.

If you have an HTC Legend and can't access your computer as hard drive after updating from Eclair (2.1) to Froyo (2.2);  here's how I fixed this issue on my phone:

Go to settings.  Applications.
Select the "running" tab at top.
Scroll until you find "connect to PC" and select it.
When it opens tap the "force close" button.  Now tap the "clear data button"; when the warning pops up select OK.

Now make sure you default connection is set in "Applications / Connect to PC" to NOT "only charge"... and check the box that says "Ask me everytime".

Now connect your phone to your PC and it can again be accessed as a disc drive.
Fantastic phone aside from the smallest albeit stunning looking screen.

Sunday, May 1, 2011

Check your mail carefully. Spear phishers out again.

From: Security Now! with Steve Gibson, Episode 295, recorded April 6, 2011

Steve: Okay.  So Epsilon is the world's largest permission-based email marketing services company.

Leo: Who knew?Steve: I know, never heard of them before.
Leo: Who knew, yeah.

Steve: 2,500 clients, including seven of the Fortune 10.  So seven of the largest 10 corporations in the United States use Epsilon to do their customer emailings.  So when we get email from, well, from 1-800-Flowers, AbeBooks, Air Miles, Ameriprise Financial, Barclays Bank, Beachbody, bebe stores, Best Buy, Brookstone, Capitol One, City Market, Citi, Dillons, Disney...
Leo:Steve: ...Destinations, Eileen Fisher, Ethan Allen, Food 4 Less, Fred Meyer, Fry's, Hilton Honors Program, Home Shopping Network, Jay C, JPMorgan Chase, King Soopers, Kroger, Lacoste, LL Bean Visa Card, Marriott Rewards, McKinsey & Company, MoneyGram, New York & Company, QFC, Ralphs, Red Roof Inn, Ritz-Carlton Rewards, Robert Half, Target, The College Board, TD Ameritrade, TiVo, US Bank, and Walgreens.  They were all breached.  That is, Epsilon is saying that 2 percent of its email clients, which 2 percent of 2,500 would be, what, 50, were affected.  Well, I just read the list of known clients who are now vulnerable to a much heightened level of spear-phishing.  The problem is that what was lost was the email databases for those companies.

Leo:Steve: Well, and names.
Leo: And names.

Steve: And that's the problem is that there's now - there's a much greater chance that you will click on a Hilton Honors Program email that knows your name.
So, I mean, the real news is read the email, then manually go to the website, entering the URL yourself, logging in, not through email, but using LastPass or whatever you use for logging in, and arrange to achieve the same end, but not clicking something that you receive in email.  Treat the email as just the information that something is important that they're bringing to your attention, like, oh, look, your miles are about to expire unless they hear from you immediately.Generally the phishing emails use an emergency of some sort to get people to act.  They're not saying, hi, we just wanted to make sure you're happy with the service we're providing you because people go, yeah, yeah, yeah, fine, delete.  No, it's that there's a call to action in spear-phishing emails that is presenting you with some dire event unless you take action.  And people go, ooh.  And in the moment of worry, they hit that, they click on that link without - even if they know better, it's like, oh, I'd better do this right now.

Listen to whole episode:
http://media.GRC.com/sn/SN-295.mp3

Get more:
http://twit.tv/sn

Friday, April 22, 2011

OTA HDTV Edmonton

It is fantastic.  CBC is now in HD over the air in Edmonton.  I now get City TV and CBC.  Global has a signal but only shows up as a blank screen... can't see Shaw putting money into an OTA signal; they're in the business of selling cable.  Kudos to CBC for getting HD OTA for the NHL playoffs.  Note to advertisers: I never watch Global - can't get a signal.

Tuesday, April 12, 2011

HTC Legend, after Froyo no PC connection

Found on a forum:
hello. I've got a htc legend with o problem. I can't connect to pc. It said usb device not recognized. I tried to connect on 4 pc with different windows, change cablefrom pc to phone. I install the android sdk and adb. It still not recognized. I don't know what to do. It can have something with it fall on the asphalt and enter some snow in the usb. It oxidized little but I clean ther. It work's until I has made the update to froyo and before it meet with asphalt and with snow. I what some answers cause I'm desperate to resolve this problem. Sorry for my english and thanks
« Reply #1 on: March 07, 2011, 06:59:15 AM »

hi im sitting with the same problem, cant connect to PC through USB.. mine does not give me a option to select disk drive or recharge or sync, it only begins to recharge. And im sure that it was after updating to froyo..  hope some one out there have a solution to this.. 
I have the same problem on my HTC Legend, after Froyo no PC connection.  I have a new install on SSD of Windows 7 so this is a first time plug in for phone after Froyo and no go.  Worked great before accessing phone as a drive, now it only charges.   Doesn't show up as drive or device; it just doesn't exist to windows; but the power does run through computer to usb and charges.
Thank God we have Dropbox so I can move things to and from my phone.  The catch there is that will cost me MB's against my perpetually dropping cap... odd how computers just keep making leaps and bounds in performance all the whilst the service providers run on archaic equipment (a guess seems as no carriers have enough bytes).  The cable company now provides phone service and internet; and the phone companies have internet and cable... why is there no competition AND where's the SPEED!

Saturday, April 9, 2011

Virgin Canada HTC Legend gets.Froyo

Upgrade your Legend to the new Android 2.2 Froyo software over WiFi. Get full details at http://tinyurl.com/469b5oh Love, Virgin Mobile.

Friday, February 18, 2011

Canadian Bandwidth

Really bizarre as so many services move to the cloud or streaming that all of a sudden bandwidth is at a premium.   not bad enough that they sell you up to speeds that you'll never be able to sustain... without power boost and if your file is over the power boost limit it is unlikely you'll get more than 10-12.5% of your up to speed.  On the top package my bandwidth recently dropped 30%; cost drop: 0%.  Should ISP be involved in cable TV delivery, or even worse TV content delivery - conflict of interest... seems it's all about owning competing products and wanting customers to pay for them all.  What are the odds of getting a solid OTA signial from a company that owns the broadcaster and a cable company that can deliver the signal.  And then the cable box compresses your HD signal so it's not as good as OTA anyway.

Bandwith is not water... it is not finite.  Hope Leo doesn't mind, here is Americam Tom Merritt's take on the whole deal:



Check the whole episode here:

TWiT 287: Finckenstein's Monster

Monday, February 14, 2011

Virgin Canada Froyo update for HTC Legend - Bell/Shaw

Seems since Bell got the last last 15% of Virgin Canada it's no longer a Virgin but rather an old hag.  Customer service has become second rate; spent 20 minutes with customer service and all she could tell me was that I had Eclair.  It seemed quite apparent this woman rarely if ever used a cell phone.
Anyways my Eclair is stale and I want my Froyo; as would Android developers so I could move my apps and buy more.
Anyone make any sense of these e-mails:

David
I'm the new owner of an HTC Legend.  Great phone and everything, but still running Android Eclair.

When we will have the update to 2.2?  Is is true that Virgin won't get that update?

I don't want to be stuck with a phone that cannot be updated unless I root it.

Thanks for your time :]
about 2 months ago


Virgin won't update the Legend.  I got this email from them a couple of days ago

Thank you for taking the time to write in to us.  We're happy to hear from you and we hope you're doing well today!

Virgin Mobile is not supporting the upgrade to the new 2.2 OS. The best thing to do would be to contact the manufacturer of your handset to get the information needed for the upgrade. Sorry!

Have a great day!

Cheers,
Christina
VMC Team



and when I emailed HTC this is what they had to say.

HTC



I do understand your disappointment with the fact that your device will not be receiving an update to Android 2.2. Unfortunately, the most telling sentence is the first in the reply Virgin Mobile sent you: Virgin Mobile is not supporting the upgrade to the new 2.2 OS. As we are the manufacturer, we can only make upgrades for carrier branded devices at the request of that carrier; they have to want to hold a license for the software version, and they also make requests for specifications for the OS. As Virgin has decided against supporting the upgrade, they will not have made that request to us, and thus we cannot create an update to the OS for that device. Were they to want the upgrade, our engineers would gladly be able to create the update, but unfortunately in this case that is not to be. I will give Virgin Mobile kudos on being upfront with you about it; I know that some carriers don't make public statements about whether or not certain devices will be updated and they leave their customers to speculate. The only thing I see wrong is that they directed you to us about it like we could change it; perhaps they just wanted us to be able to explain to you why we couldn't do anything if they did not want us to. I do apologize for any inconvenience you may have experienced.



Sincerely,

Philip

HTC
about 2 months ago

Virgin Mobile Canada
hey guys - i'm sorry for the mixup. we may, at one time, have been considering not supporting the android 2.2 froyo upgrade, but, as i tweeted yesterday, we're planning on launching the upgrade in mid-january.

follow us here on facebook or on twitter @virginmobilecan for updates closer to the actual launch.

sorry again for any confusion.

jeremy
social media manager
virgin mobile
about a month ago



So Froyo was originally going to be released in the fourth quarter of 2010, then mid January 2011; it's mid February 2011 and still notta from Virgin.  Perhaps those Virgin (aka Bell) folks are too busy in talks with Shaw to see how the can get more for our internet dollars.
At a time when Shaw claims people are using more they are dropping monthly usage rates by up to 30%, and telling me how much faster cable is than DSL... DO I REALLY NEED HIGH SPEED IF THE INTERNET HIGHWAY IS GETTING SHORTER!

Oh well, a post about Virgin's lack ends up with a Shaw grab; notice that since the elder Shaw passed the company to the sons everything went up in price and down in value.