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Demon-Haunted World

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Re: Demon-Haunted World

#71

Post by ghostly_s »

kbenson wrote: post #30
kbsletten wrote: post #25

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's probably to avoid/mitigate lawsuits. It's possible that this would still be covered under false advertising but there's something to be said about the feasibility of testing a lot of unopened packages to show the ink level is low vs having to run all those packages down within the parameters of the device (so the testers aren't seen as the cheaters, over-using the cartridges to make the problem seem worse than i…

There's a lot a wiggle room in saying that your ink is almost out. The simple defense is that they don't want people to have wasted prints, which might happen if the ink for one color actually runs out, so they notify a little earlier. That "little earlier" is vague and relative, giving a lot of defensible ground for a lawyer to work with if it comes to that. Stating you are selling a certain amount of something and…

Right. Putting a different amount of ink in the package than is indicated on the label would be out-and-out fraud, and easily detected. This route operates firmly within a legal grey area.

Plus, increasing the actual volume of product you sell without relying on a commensurate increase in demand is basically printing (heh) money as far as corporate returns are concerned.

Re: Demon-Haunted World

#72

Post by mholmes680 »

zackmorris wrote: post #52

Startup idea: Form a company that explores new markets in legal liabilities. It could bring lawsuits with little risk where the payoff could be billions of dollars. Off the top of my head: * Research whether channels were engineered into smartphones to allow water to leak in (since they have no moving parts and should self-evidently be watertight). * Find the planned-obsolescence parts in things like car doors that w…

Devil's advocate here... I would have hoped the opportunities were so lucrative that whistleblowers would have already, eh, blown the whistle. That's exactly the point of the whistleblower's protection laws.

So maybe these things aren't as widespread as you'd think... at least not in a legal sense. I'd also like to think that maybe people aren't "designing" flaws into things rather than finding the maximum economic benefit, or just are "naive" to what they design.

Re: Demon-Haunted World

#73

Post by abecedarius »

52-6F-62 wrote: post #44
zaroth wrote: post #17

Why do our phones, which certainly felt damn snappy the day we bought them, inevitablely seem to slow down to the point of unusability after a couple dozen months? Even after a factory reset and installing no apps at all... I know it didn't take that long to open/close the built in apps when I bought that iPhone 4, 5, 5s... The only thing I can think of is the flash drive is slowing down as it wears. Or, the CPU cloc…

I've experienced and noticed a different problem. I've had the same phone for almost 5 years (have a hard time replacing something that still works well and is in good condition), and I've found it's not the speed that has worsened and I can live with not having certain features to run some new apps; it's the storage. My phone's storage is not large by today's standards, I have 16 GB. I run fewer apps than I did when…

This happened to me too on an Android phone. It turned out according to the web to be some logfile that keeps growing and which I don't know how to delete -- it doesn't show up in the system-provided views of what's on there. (I'm sorry this is so vague, I'm not interested in Android and it's been quite a while since I gave up.)

It's still running because I deleted all the apps except a few core ones, but I'd appreciate some tips about this too.

Re: Demon-Haunted World

#74

Post by brians »

captaincrowbar wrote: post #14

Doctorow mentions the cases where a printer company has made their software lie about how much ink was left in a cartridge to make consumers replace them more often. I always wondered why a manufacturer would want to do that. I mean, I understand the motive of making consumers buy ink more often, but from the manufacturer's point of view, why would they want to throw perfectly good ink away? Colour ink isn't as expen…

Sensors are expensive. Counters are cheap. Put in ink by weight. Assume pages at 60th percentile use of each color. Set counter. At zero, whine for more ink.

Re: Demon-Haunted World

#75

Post by walterbell »

mikeash wrote: post #29
zaroth wrote: post #17

Why do our phones, which certainly felt damn snappy the day we bought them, inevitablely seem to slow down to the point of unusability after a couple dozen months? Even after a factory reset and installing no apps at all... I know it didn't take that long to open/close the built in apps when I bought that iPhone 4, 5, 5s... The only thing I can think of is the flash drive is slowing down as it wears. Or, the CPU cloc…

Next time I get a new phone, I'm going to put together a performance testing plan and record a video of it on the new phone. Then any time I wonder about this, I can run through the plan again and compare with the recording. So, ask me again in a few years.

Might need an identical control device that does not receive software updates.

Re: Demon-Haunted World

#76

Post by fouc »

mholmes680 wrote: post #72
zackmorris wrote: post #52

Startup idea: Form a company that explores new markets in legal liabilities. It could bring lawsuits with little risk where the payoff could be billions of dollars. Off the top of my head: * Research whether channels were engineered into smartphones to allow water to leak in (since they have no moving parts and should self-evidently be watertight). * Find the planned-obsolescence parts in things like car doors that w…

Devil's advocate here... I would have hoped the opportunities were so lucrative that whistleblowers would have already, eh, blown the whistle. That's exactly the point of the whistleblower's protection laws. So maybe these things aren't as widespread as you'd think... at least not in a legal sense. I'd also like to think that maybe people aren't "designing" flaws into things rather than finding the maximum economic b…

It's probably standard practice

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Planned_obsolescence

Re: Demon-Haunted World

#77

Post by russdill »

captaincrowbar wrote: post #14

Doctorow mentions the cases where a printer company has made their software lie about how much ink was left in a cartridge to make consumers replace them more often. I always wondered why a manufacturer would want to do that. I mean, I understand the motive of making consumers buy ink more often, but from the manufacturer's point of view, why would they want to throw perfectly good ink away? Colour ink isn't as expen…

From an engineering point of view, it's much cheaper to calculate to when 0.01% of cartridges will have run out of ink based on print history vs accurately measuring ink inside the cartridge.

Of course that means that 99.99% of cartridges will be discarded with remaining ink, some of them with a rather significant quantity of ink. And it gives the opportunity to tune this number so cartridges are bought earlier. Although it's up to the manufacturer just how much ink is included, so the usefulness of this tactic is somewhat limited.

I remember what is was like when you'd print a 50 page document only to discover around page 24 you'd start seeing white streaks...and more streaks, and by page 50 you'd have nearly blank pages. Having the printer stop and let you put in a new cartridge when ink is low is a helpful feature.

However, the lockout of third party or even refilled cartridges is just egregious.

Re: Demon-Haunted World

#78

Post by freehunter »

SubiculumCode wrote: post #10

This is what I think about at the pump. More and more I see gas pumps ask if you want a receipt BEFORE the gas is dispensed. This seems risky. If you decline the receipt and then dispense gas, the pump could cheat on the amount of gas dispensed with less risk, as a papered record of the purchase amount and price is not produced. If on the other hand, the pump waits to ask if you desire a receipt until after the gasol…

The hard part with that is, see the sticker on the outside of the pump? That certifies that this pump meets your state's regulations and that someone has inspected it recently. In order to have a coverup like that, you'd need the government to be in on it too.

Re: Demon-Haunted World

#79

Post by zlynx »

emerongi wrote: post #64
bmurphy1976 wrote: post #46

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I've experienced slow-downs with both iOS and Android devices. They almost always corresponded with newer versions of operating system and all the extra functionality that came with the upgrade. The apps are also evolving. Compare Facebook today to what it was two or three years ago. The app does a ton more and all that extra functionality doesn't come for free. I suspect one of the primary reasons they broke messeng…

I still have the original Nexus 7 and it's unbelievable how unusable it has become. I use a slim ROM of KitKat (the Android version it came with) and it's still so freaking sluggish. I only use it for watching videos now, it's unbearable for anything interactive. It used to be quite nice with the slim ROMs, but at this point nothing has helped to get it back to run like it used to. 4years of light use (99% of time si…

The biggest problem on some of these is the lack of TRIM support in the hardware and/or operating system.

After the device has written its complete 32 GB or whatever, it drops into slow mode on the storage Flash.

There are ways to get the storage performance back, just search for Nexus 7 and trim.

Re: Demon-Haunted World

#80

Post by ThrustVectoring »

naringas wrote: post #36
dclowd9901 wrote: post #4

Counterpoint: software such as thermostats that control our energy consumption or phones that lock themselves while you're driving are better if people can't consume in a responsible manner. Is it nanny-state? Yes, but maybe some people need a nanny.

> maybe some people need a nanny. children do

All snark aside, there's often situations where it makes sense to want to be controlled. Coordination problems, in short. There's situations where everyone is better off if everyone follows a particular rule, but people are personally rewarded for breaking the rule. Say, "don't catch all the fish in a lake", or "don't have loud parties late at night that wake up your neighbors".

Following the rule yourself won't magically make other people follow the rule as well. As far as the mobile phone example goes - yes, anti-texting-while-driving software is something I would not install on my phone if given the choice. I'd consider making it mandatory to install it on all phones, though. I'm responsible enough to not text while driving, but whether I make that decision correctly doesn't keep someone else from plowing into me.

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