Posts by solidsoup

Fuming fanbois flood 'flimsy iPhone 5 Wi-Fi' forum

Re: Let's try this again

Sarcasm, hence the icon. The post is exactly like the sarcastic one I made ab. USB issue. With similar results :P

Let's try this again

This is exactly like that sticking USB-connector non-issue. Wireless networking is notoriously subjective and finicky. All kinds of things, from industrial generators to adult toys, can cause a lot of interference. Most of the current wireless APs use the unfinished 'N' standard, potentially causing compatibility issues with future hardware - just like it seems happened in this case. I bet that WiFi works just fine for people who use the current generation of Apple Time Capsule. Some people, like the Reg, will always blame Apple, even though there's plenty of other hardware that can potentially be blamed. Either make sure all your WiFi hardware is standard-compliant or find yourself another phone. This isn't Apple's problem..

Canonical bungs kill switch onto Ubuntu's Amazon 'adware'

Re: Canonical should have a care....

This is following a tired script that has played out many times in different businesses.

1. Do something boneheaded and immoral to monetize a free product at the expense of users.

2. Once the negative reaction occurs, pretend you don't know what the fuss is about, further antagonizing users.

3. Climb down proclaiming mea culpa.

4. Do the same thing in a less obvious manner when the attention and most vocal opponents have moved on.

Canonical will pull this again soon enough. Perhaps they should ask Facebook for advice. They've become proficient at it, bitch.

Russia blocks Monsanto corn in GM study fallout

Re: @solidsoup - One more thing

It's somewhat unfortunate you see the debate as having sides of Monsanto and Greenpeace and what I was in essence railing against. Those aren't the sides. It's beneficial for greens to make that out to be the debate, but Monsanto is but a small part of a large field of companies (many small startups) that work in GM field. Being keenly aware of Monsanto transgressions, I find myself in weird position of almost defending them because their actions are often represented to be worse than they are due to their reputation (a form of argument ad hominem). Dismissing the entire GM field because of Monsanto is similar to dismissing computer technology in 1950s and 60s because IBM actively helped Nazis during the Holocaust. Where would we be now if that was the case?

As to Americans and their disgusting eating habits, there is one thing and one thing only to blame for their miserable health and massive waistlines - sugar. Or more specifically monosaccharides. Of course, it's completely natural, so there's no culprit to blame besides ones own gluttony. As such, its not a popular pinata as pesticides, GM, and hormones. After all, if you eat too much unhealthy sugary foods, there's some self-reflection required, but blaming the food producers offers an easy out.

Re: One more thing

Spare as your copy-pasta. Or at least make sure your links work. Also, Greenpeace!? LOL!

Re: Conflation (@ solidsoup)

Cross-pollination was not an issue in the case. Please, read the case summary. Also, since it got to the Canadian supreme court, it's reasonable to assume that the farmer's legal representation was somewhat more substantial than you make it out to be.

Re: Conflation part III: mutation/evolution in the wild =/= gene transfer

@Ian McNee

It's pretty clear from my post that I wouldn't trust Monsanto. I think you'll find that all corporations are profit driven and it is up to the government to limit them in their actions. One of the big arguments against GM is that it uses genetic material from different species and there is widespread belief among the general public that this is unprecedented in nature. That's not the case and I was talking about horizontal gene transfer, not evolution.

I don't know if you realize, but your beef with GMO can also be taken up with agriculture in general. The very goal of agriculture is to "out-compete organisms in the wider ecosystem". Agriculture also has "potential for unpredictable consequences". There's also nothing random about evolution in agriculture, traits were selected for artificially. I'm not saying there aren't any serious concerns about GM, but none of them can be found in your post.

Knife to a gunfight

If you're going to argue, facts and logic are more effective than passive aggressive deflection. Farmer suicides in India have little to do with Monsanto and have absolutely nothing to do with GM nature of their crops. Moreover, even if what you say was true, it would not contradict my claim that GM crops saved millions of lives. According to WHO, chronic food deficits affect 792 million people worldwide. Malnutrition affects 1 in 3 people and dwarfs all major diseases in its effects.

I'm not sure why you danced around the word bullshit, seeing as Register doesn't filter profanity, but this pious self-righteous attitude of anti-GM/anti-Nuclear/Global Warming/Greenpeace/PETA brigade (these things are fruits from the same tree) is getting fucking annoying. This well-intentioned willful ignorance has cost more lives and caused more damage to the environment than any of the "evil" corporations could ever aspire to.

Conflation

It's become fashionable to conflate GM, Monsanto, and Roundup. In fact, the three have become inextricably linked. That's unfortunate. Monsanto is the proverbial evil corporation that has done a lot of unethical things and is responsible for billions in environmental damage. It's paid quite a bit to settle those cases. That said, I don't think it paid nearly enough.

Roundup is their main product line of GM crops that are resistant to Roundup herbicide (not pesticide as most people say). It's a clever product that they spent billions researching and developing. However, the herbicide patent has expired and so one can buy it from any number of third parties. Genetic patents on various crops are also expiring (first one in 2014). At any rate, natural resistance is going to make the whole thing moot soon enough anyway. It was good while it lasted and really increased yields. Farmers wouldn't use it otherwise. There was also that bullshit case greenies like to bring up so much, forgetting that the judge dismissed farmer's claims of accidental contamination, seeing how 60% of his plants were Roundup-ready.

Now GM in general is just a technology which can be utilized for the benefit of mankind or create havoc without reasonable constraints. The concerns about GM causing cancer are completely unfounded with zero evidence to back them up. In fact, greenies are useful idiots at the hands of competing corporate interests. Note that gene transfer between different species happens in nature all the time. Rather than running around waving their hands hysterically, people should realize that GM is here to stay because in the coming years it will be necessary to feed the growing population. In fact, GM has already saves millions of lives in poor countries due to increased yields.

Google charms Greenpeace with wind powered data center deal

Greenpeace

I wanted to write a detailed elucidation of my feelings towards Greenpeace and how they drifted over the years to become the radical organization they are now. How what started as a well-intentioned quest to stand up for our environment turned into corporate blackmail and media whoring. But you know what, I just don't care anymore. I'll say simply this: FUCK GREENPEACE.

Cisco CEO wouldn't bet the farm on HP turnaround

Good Intentions(tm)

....is the best paving material money can't buy.

Intel CEO thinks Windows 8 isn't ready, insider claims

Zombie Steve Jobs

I like that Microsoft removed the start menu. They spent billions on dollars on this thing and all they managed to do was to copy us.

Eric Schmidt: Ha ha, NO Google maps app for iPhone 5

Apple is too fucking greedy for their own good. They could've took over Nokia for 10 billion and change (not advocating it, just a smart business move). This would've given them a map system that rivals Google's and thousands of patents with only a few that deal with corners. Think of all the havoc they could've caused with that? Windows phone wouldn't just be dead on arrival, it just wouldn't happen. Virtually every manufacturer would be paying rent to Apple. At the very least, they could've licensed Nokia maps for a few hundred mil and combined them with their own in-house features, providing their cult followers an experience that rivaled Google's.

What they did instead was to quickly hack together a product that works worse than Google Maps in 2005. And the reason they did so is because they expect the iFans to swallow it and ask for more. Apple is getting too greedy and cocky and that will be their downfall soon enough.

iPhone 5 Lightning cables sticking in USB ports

Re: Usual Apple bashing

I was hoping the downvotes from people who didn't get sarcasm would cancel out by upvotes from fanbois... who didn't get sarcasm. I guess not. Oh well, at least I wasn't labeled a sexist for blaming female parts.

@Malcolm Weir

What's this Occam's Razor you speak of? Is that the one with expensive proprietary and incompatible cartridges?

Can't you read?

I said current generation hardware. The guy was probably using power block from his iPhone 4 or even worse 3GS.

Usual Apple bashing

It was probably the female sockets that are to blame. A lot of computer equipment has ones that aren't specced properly. I bet it works fine with all current generation Apple hardware. Not sure why people would use an iPhone with a non-Mac computer anyway. This is a usual Apple bashing by the Reg. Either make sure all your USB ports are up to spec or find another yourself another phone. This isn't Apples problem.

Apple Maps to the rescue in China/Japan conflict

Dodged one

So there are now two sets of islands? Nicely played. Perhaps we should address other territorial disputes by getting the leaders to use iPhone 5. I, for one, am just glad the iOS 6 Maps didn't point to Hawaii for the Senkoku query. Would've been awkward when Japanese fleet showed up.

Cisco scores AU$38m NBN win

This is pocket change

Providing connectivity for national broadband backbone? Bah! Filtering and data mining - that's where the money (from Oz gubermint) is.

Apple weekend iPhone 5 sales miss forecasts

Re: analysts BS

Brilliant strategy by Apple. Rather than face disappointing results, create artificial scarcity. It's a win win. You get to sell more phones, because now there's a perception of limited supply, increasing the perceived value AND if you sell fewer of them than analysts expect then it's due to short supply (implying that sales would've been better had there been no shortages, which is patently* false).

As to comparing S3 numbers to iPhone 5 - direct comparison is rubbish. S3 is but one of many Android phones, many with competing or comparable features. Apple is the only one in its ecosystem and so iPhone 5 has no competition within it. If you believe iPhone 5 is a huge success, won't you do us all a favor and buy Apple stock.

*- pun intended

Fans revolt over Amazon 'adware' in Ubuntu desktop search results

Re: Big deal....

Beg to differ. Of course one could remove it, similarly one can hold the phone differently. But why do you have to? Ubuntu is different from Windows and MacOS because most of the code is contributed and most contributors do so for free. They expect the project to uphold a certain spirit of altruism. This latest action violates that spirit and the contributors are rightfully pissed.

If Canonical wanted to make some extra cash, they could have made it a feature - allowing people to select which websites (including many online retailers) they want to appear in online section of their search. Picking just Amazon is blatant advertising. What's worse is that rather than encrypting the queries, they send them in plain tax. This is a massive fail.

Apple scrambled to hire iOS 6 maps engineers DAYS before launch

Re: So glad my iPod Touch is obsolete

It's not a good trend for Apple when their older hardware is widely considered to be better. iPhone 5 was REALLY underwhelming. Look at pictures that show it side by side with Galaxy S3. Apple has done quite a few underwhelming products in the past, or products that lacked features. However, they've never released something that was so half-baked and a giant step backward as iOS 6 Maps.

I think this may be the turning point in their meteoric rise and it's going to be downhill from here. I certainly don't want Apple to disappear, but it would be splendid if they get taken down a peg or two.

Chase joins Bank of America in possible Islamic attack outage

Re: Every orchestra requires a conductor (@ Khaptain )

The reality is almost always more complex and interesting than the conspiracy theories. It really wasn't about the movie. Here is what actually (as well as I can discern it) happened:

0. The clips from Innocence of Muslims make the rounds in Egyptian media on 09/08 and 09/09. While their appearance in Egyptian media could've been planned, note that no demonstrations occur on those dates.

1. Muslim extremists celebrate 9/11 as they do every year by protesting. This year demos are particularly rowdy as Egyptian and Libyan authorities, who should know about these things in advance do nothing to make US embassies off limits. Some actually do protest Innocence of Muslims as it was in the news in Egypt recently.

2. An al Qaeda-affiliated cell uses this as a perfect cover to conduct an attack in Libya on poorly secured consulate. This indicates there was likely a signal to affiliated imams to increase attendance at the protests and swell the numbers.

3. Before the details on Benghazi attack are known, US embassy in Egypt releases a statement effectively apologizing for the movie. A highly unusual move and unlikely to be done without authorization from State Dept. I speculate that this was done with the intention to deflect the attention from the fact that its 9/11. A huge protest at US embassies looks bad for Obama's poll numbers. After all, he caught a lot of flack for siding with Arab Spring protests in Egypt and Libya. US public is sensitive to 9/11 and Republicans would jump at the opportunity.

4. Media picks and regurgitates the line about Innocence of Muslims being the trigger for the protests (never mind that timeline is wrong - see 0). Continued mention of the movie by State Dept. and White House keep it the focus of media reports. It's a weird thing to do, as continued mention of the alleged trigger is pretty daft.

5. On Sept 12 this is picked up by Arab satellite channels and the social networks. Since the movie is now widely assumed to be the trigger for the protests, it becomes the center of the news story. Secondary and tertiary protests occur as the this spreads to new countries. This time people are protesting the movie.

Re: Time for a Radical Muslim Disconnection

""EU" is not a country."

Not yet. Though if debt mutualization proceeds, that's not far off for Eurozone. More importantly, however, EU is a common market. Wait a second, what was your point exactly?

Re: Every orchestra requires a conductor

As to the origin of the attack, I would guess Turkey.

Re: Time for a Radical Muslim Disconnection

This is exactly about the oil, but still downvoted. As fashionable as it is to blame Yanks, EU buys significantly more oil from Muslim countries than US does. In fact, Libya conflict was mostly done by France, UK, and Italy because that's where you guys get a lot of your oil. US was a reluctant participant because none those countries could handle military logistics.

Re: Every orchestra requires a conductor

It's exactly like that! However, it's not as mysterious as you think. The conductors are are well known to our intelligence agencies and those who actually look beyond the media reports. I'll name a few in no particular order:

1. ISI - Pakistani Intelligence

They are the ones who created Taliban as a force against India and to wield power over Afghan territory. ISI also has extensive cooperation with Haqqani network and Al Qaeda. After all, they sheltered bin Laden for years. The terrorism that's happening daily in Pakistan are the chickens coming home to roost. US and India better have a plan to secure their nuclear stockpile because this is going to get a lot worse.

2. Iran

Iran has for years financed Hezbollah and Hamas to the tune of billions of dollars, as well as dozens more obscure terrorist groups. Hezbollah particularly is being used as deterrent against Israeli strike on Iranian nuclear program. They have stockpiled 10,000 grad missiles that would be used against Israeli civilian population centers, should a strike take place. Interestingly, Hamas has recently fallen out of favor because of their refusal to come out in support of Bashar Assad. Instead, Iran increased financing to Islamic Jihad and Bedouin groups in Sinai desert in Egypt. Thus recent attacks against Egyptian army, UN peacekeepers, and Israeli checkpoints. Hamas (same guys who brought you the initial wave of suicide bombings in 1990s) is now fighting to prevent attacks against Israel, as it stands the most to lose from Israeli retaliation. The irony is palpable.

3. Al Qaeda

Though largely eliminated in Afghanistan and Pakistan, they're have grown tremendously in North Africa and Arabian Peninsula. They've been distracted recently by the civil wars in Lybia, Yemen and Syria (where they are still fighting Assad). However, if the attack in Libya is any indication, that distraction is fading.

4. Muslim Brotherhood

People behind Hamas and the current Egyptian president Morsi. They are the largest Muslim org and have both political, charity, and militant arms. They depend in large part on donations from Muslims in the West, so try to avoid stirring up trouble directly, instead keeping and organization of ostensibly independent small militant groups that would do their bidding. Don't get along with Wahhabi Islam as promoted by Saudi Arabia.

5. Saudi Arabia

This is the singular source of the rise of modern Islamic extremists. While mostly responsible for spreading Wahhabi ideology and paying handsomely to anyone who does, rather than any terrorist acts (identity of 9/11 hijackers not withstanding), it has been the impetus behind the entire wave of Islamic extremism. Most Islamic fundamentalist groups (excluding Shia ones) can be traced to some Saudi cleric. Unfortunately, we don't confront it directly because we buy oil from them.

6. Good musician don't need a conductor.

There are a good number of Muslim leaders who, while being moderate themselves, know where their loyalties lie and know better than to go against "the street." This is why there is seemingly a high degree of coordination. You will notice that most Muslim governments condemned the movie, but few condemned the embassy attacks. This also applies to Turkey, which wants to be in the EU!

7. Mix it all together.

All the groups actually hate each other. Saudi Arabia is the Sunni power center and they hate Iran (Shia power center). The current conflict in Syria is actually about that. Syria is ruled by Allawites who are Shia, but majority of the population is Sunni. Pakistan in an explosive mix of both, hence the attacks. And ALL of them together hate Jews and Americans. This is also why Iran can't be allowed to have a nuclear weapon. The moment it does, Saudi Arabia will get one too. Then Turkey and Egypt. Of course, people who don't know history, geography, politics, and science will argue that Iran has an inherent right to a nuclear weapon because US has one.

Did genetically modified food cause giant tumours in rats?

Bullshit study. Statistical analysis set up and release strategy suggest an agenda.

Baidu's patriotic doodle ruffles Japanese feathers

China jumped the shark.

China is at least a decade away from being able to utilize the energy resources around those islands or even confront Japan militarily, given the treaty Japan has with US. They've started the whole row prematurely, so I wonder what else is at play. Could it be that their growth numbers are not as great as they pretend and the juggernaut of the Chinese economy has actually slowed down tremendously after the 2008 crisis, fake number put out by PRC notwithstanding? Now you have real estate bubble, demographic crisis, and a slowdown in investment all hitting China at once in the coming 2-3 years.

It seems that people who have written US and Europe off in favor of the rising China have also jumped the shark. I, for one, will be only too happy for them to be proven conclusively wrong.

Governments block YouTube over that video

Re: This is not about the video.

@AndrueC

I completely agree with your sentiment, but can't shake the sense that you're looking at it the wrong way. Triggers imply that there was something that we've done that caused the reaction and if we did those things less, we could control it. Already there are people saying in this thread that the movie is not worth it. I'm curious where they draw the line.

Again, this was a routine annual protest. The difference this year is that US ambassador was killed. The fact that most people don't know it's a routine 9/11 protest (imagine that combination of words!) is the disturbing thing. There's an uncomfortable dance being done by the media, our governments, Muslim leaders, liberal apologists, and the public at large. They are all dancing around the elephant in the room - Islam as a religion as practiced by most Muslims (yes, Muslims in general) is incompatible with our modern values. The Islamists recognize that incompatibility and we pretend it doesn't exist. The only reason we do it is because we whored our ideals out for oil.

Re: @solidsoup

No one is protesting these attacks anywhere in the Muslim world. They're all protesting the movie! That's the problem. J1 claims that insults to Muhammed are extremely insulting to Muslims (seemingly justifying such reaction). He also implies (and I'm sure many posters would agree) that Islam is a respectful religion and should not be judged by actions of the minority. Is shedding innocent blood in the name of Muhhamed as insulting as the movie? Where are the protests against that or any other instances where the name of the Prophet was used not merely mockingly but to justify violence? The two claims I mentioned are incompatible with each other within the same logical argument, unless there's evidence of such protests.

Re: Semiotics

Right. In Libya, US ambassador and 3 other Americans were killed after a 4 hour assault in Benghazi. That happens to be the same city that was saved from an inevitable massacre by US Air Force bombing Gaddafi's tank columns 3km from the city.

Re: @solidsoup

Good question. It's not at all obvious and very relevant to the issue at hand. There are two claims at work here (I trust you have sufficient reading comprehension to infer them from J1s post).

1. The extremists are a few bad apples who pervert Islam and should not cast a shadow over Islam as a religion.

2. Muslims are very protective of their religion and actively protest any insults.

Would it, therefore, not be logical to question the demonstrations that occurred against people who shed innocent blood (and did all those other things I listed) in the name of Muhammed (blessings and peace be upon his name) thus insulting what Islam actually stands for?

"on the other you have a bunch of rednecks ... who want to tar one group of people all with the same brush"

LOL! Irony?

@J1

Please, point me to examples when Muslims protested honor killings, Jihad, genital mutilation, destruction of UNESCO site in Afghanistan, stoning, suicide bombings, teaching children to hate Americans and Jews, Sharia law as interpreted by Salfists - anything that through action shows that the extremists are not representative of Muslims in general.

Re: This is not about the video.

Then you're clearly missing the point. Instead of having a debate about how we approach Muslim extremism, both in our own countries and as a foreign policy towards countries that tolerate it, we're having one about the limits of free speech.

From a legal standpoint, hate speech is speech that is inherently threatening to a group of people or can cause that group to be discriminated against. In US, short of direct incitement to violence, such speech is protected by the First Amendment. Note, however, that the movie in question wouldn't even qualify as hate speech. While, it mocks Muhammed and Islam (and does a terrible job of doing that), it is no more hate speech than the episode of South Park about Catholic Church.

Self-censorship.

This is kind of cool actually. I wonder if anyone has noticed. Go back through this thread and read the posts. Christianity is mentioned more times than Islam, even though it has nothing to do with the article. Posts that decry the Islamists' behavior expressly avoid mentioning them or Muhammed. I don't think there's much to add to this.

This is not about the video.

This media-created theory is complete nonsense. Do you expect me to believe that Muslims in all these countries were hanging out on YouTube and happened to stumble upon a video uploaded 8 months ago? And that it just happened to be on September 11? Right. And I have a bridge to sell.

It's about time to start calling these things what they are - September 11 anniversary celebrations that happen every year and got out of control this time. It's not surprising either. Back when Egypt and Libya were run by dictators, there was a check on religious extremism. The "democratic" Arab Spring governments don't have that ability, desire, or both. In fact, it suits their interests to stoke fire against "external enemies" to deflect focus from their own failings.

This movie theory has been pushed forward as it suits all the big players involved. Obama administration doesn't want to admit that its approach to the Arab Spring was naive and misguided - governments in countries he championed democracy in (against American interests) turn a blind eye to violent 9/11 celebrations, media doesn't want to appear politically incorrect and racist, moderate Muslim leaders don't want Islam to appear savage. "It's all in reaction to a movie" theory suits everyone. Doesn't make it true though.

Microsoft, RIM ink new licensing agreement

Inquring minds want to know.

Did Microsoft also secretly license Android to RIM?

Nvidia puts Tesla K20 GPU coprocessor through its paces

Pretty charts. However, without Crysis 2 benchmark scores, this article is just a regurgitated press release.

Win8 tablets may cost MORE than iPads – AND LAPTOPS

Is Balmer married? What about Meg Whitman? They'd make a nice couple.

As to Asus vs MS, it actually doesn't matter. Asus wouldn't be pricing their tablets that way if MS price (which I'm sure they're aware of) wasn't in the ballpark. Conversely, MS wouldn't significantly underprice the OEMs they hope to license Win8 to. At best, Microsoft tablet will be $100 cheaper. Stick a fork in it boys, Windows 8 on tablets is done.

New hottest-ever extreme temperature records now easier to achieve

Re: Make up your minds

Nothing wrong with expunging the record in principle. However, "why now" is a pertinent question to ask. Is there some new information that came to light recently that wasn't available in the past 90 years? Because if not, then the impetus behind examination of details as to how that reading was acquired would seem political in nature. After all, a truly scientific examination would look at a range of readings in the data set (i.e. all readings taken with Six-Bellini thermometer), not just one particular reading, even if it is an extreme one.

My personal theory is that there's this well-intentioned but misguided (in the useful idiot sense) attempt by AGW proponents to convince the public at large that global warming is a real threat and should be urgently acted upon. There are pesky things like figures and data that contradict the urgency of the phenomenon. Of course, they must be misinterpreted by the public, or blown out of proportion by the denialists. Those things, while possibly valid scientifically are really inconvenient from a marketing standpoint. John Q may well (incorrectly) say "well, it was a lot hotter in 1920s". Therefore, for marketing purposes, all the instances of politically (rather than scientifically) incorrect data must be expunged. Orwell would be impressed.

Here's what these people are forgetting. In the fog of war, you always lose sight of the truth. They can no longer know which of their data are reliable and which has been massaged for the "greater good"(tm) with "best intentions"(tm). Climate science in essence has become like a company that has two sets of books. And while both show warming, one is just not extreme enough to get people to act.

Flame espionage weapon linked to MORE mystery malware

It's not really about the size as compared to other files and total storage. Larger size means larger footprint on the target system. Larger footprint (theoretically, Adobe software being an exception) means more functions are performed with more things to go wrong, causing detection.

Say what you will about people behind the new breed of high-end malware (Stuxnet et al), but the creativity and ingenuity involved are undeniable. It blows my mind that Flame hasn't been detected for years despite its 20MB size and has the ability to spy on Bluetooth devices around the infected PC.

HP boss Whitman: 'We have to offer a smartphone'

Re: Stupid

@AC

You picked a poor example to use to push your political correctness theory. HP's leadership has been inept for over a decade regardless of gender. Both Hurd and Apotheker were terrible. While Hurd is widely considered to be an effective CEO, it's a paper-thin veneer. He simply cut enough jobs to make HP profitable - a strategy that carries with it certain long-term consequences. Like inability to write the fucking printer drivers properly.

Re: Stupid

Interesting metaphor. Truly unfortunate too. HP used to be great primarily due to the strong research base, but also because of great products. I fondly remember my TC1000 transformer tablet. It was great and ahead of its time. Unfortunately, like with many of its promising products, HP killed the form factor. 3-4 years later it became popular.

Re: Is there some special moron CEO private school you have to attend

Except they're not rectifying anything. Bandwagon's full. HP should catch another.

When TouchPad was released, it was the third player on the market and given the quality of Android tablets at that point, the most viable alternative to iPad. If HP got the pricing right from the beginning or at the very least took one on the chin with initial losses, pumping out cheap TouchPads to increase user base, they would've been #2 right now and #1 in corporate applications (if they offered the right management software). That would've given them a great springboard into phones as well.

Now it's too late. Period. They have nothing to offer to compete with Android, iOS, WinPho 8, Amazon, and RIM (ok, that one I didn't write with a straight face). All niche's been filled or are about to. This is doomed to failure. Jumping off the departing train was stupid. Running on the tracks after it is doubly so.

HP plots tablet comeback to penetrate biz world with slab

Mum, I want those toys

So HP wants smartphones and tablets? And it wants them to be only for corporate market? Oh, this is getting better and better. And to think that it's after their previous foray ended in completely unnecessary tears and managed to piss off just about everyone. HP has zero credibility when it comes to mobile.

Tablet makes no sense if its business-only device. Corporate edition only makes sense when consumers "subsidize" the line by increasing hardware order volume. Serviceable? Bah! Do I really want the cost and privilege of servicing a tablet? How about making it cheap enough to chunk it? I predict HP will release a half-baked line of products with an exorbitant cost. Its failure would be blamed on divergent synergies or some such drivel.

Now who wants to start a countdown until Meggy is replaced...

... by someone even more idiotic, if the trend for HP CEOs holds?

ISIS puts off US NFC pay-by-bonk bid

I can see this taking off. Like video calling and 3D.