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Archive for August, 2009

What Are The Stages of Tropical Storm Development?

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Facts About Hurricanes and Tropical Storms | Scienceray.

Tropical storms are classified by peak wind speed: An easterly (tropical) wave is a group of thunderstorms traveling together, sometimes called a hurricane seedling, out of which larger storms can emerge. A tropical depression is a cluster of thunderstorms with sustained winds below 38 mph. A tropical storm is more organized, with winds between 39 and 73 mph. A hurricane has winds of 74 mph and above.

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Written by Admin

August 26th, 2009 at 3:47 pm

Posted in Science

7 Reasons to Ditch Your iPhone and AT&T

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  • They’re anticompetitive. Sure, every business wants to edge out its foes, but AT&T and Apple are now under FCC investigation for their black-box app approval process. Regulators want to know who killed the app, and why Voice is different than VOIP apps like Skype. Check out the inquiries here.
  • They’re targets. Heavy lies the crown; just ask Microsoft. When your software platform is the world leader, it earns a lot of antipathy from hackers, who spend their time engineering ways to make your device crash and burn. Already, the iPhone has been the subject of several frightening security breaches like the text message vulnerability, which Apple has fixed. But the platform has only been around a couple of years– the more success it finds, the more trouble will find you.
  • They’re dicks. When Apple rejected Google Voice from the App Store, it also pulled all other GV-related apps, some of which customers paid for. Now they’re pissed because they want refunds, and Apple is telling developers that those refunds are supposed to come out of the developers’ pockets. Not. Cool.
  • Apps are mayhem. When the iPhone had a couple of hundred apps available, you responded by downloading a handful. Now there are 50,000 of them, and you’ve responded by downloading approximately 30,000 of them. The problem: you don’t delete your superfluous apps–they’re what make the iPhone the iPhone–but you don’t want to trip over them getting to, say, important stuff like the camera. Apple’s organizational system for apps on the phone is terrible; move one, and the rest tumble into disarray, and there aren’t any ways to organize them by name, size or kind. What happens when you have more than 11 screens of apps?
  • You can’t find anything. The disarray plaguing the iPhone’s interface doesn’t get any better in iTunes, where it’s almost impossible to discover cool new apps easily without having to sift through garbage first. Third-party sites like AppBeacon help, but the more apps flood the store, the more bloated and unwieldy iTunes gets. Right now, the main conduit for discovery is the “What’s New” list, which is killing developers: it encourages them to do updates as often as possible, so they can stay on that list. That, in turn, inundates the App Store with approval requests they can’t handle. Stupid.
  • Android is beautiful. As I’ve written before, some of the Android phones out there–and 18 or 20 more are expected before 2010–are more gorgeous and functional than the iPhone could ever dream of being. Plus, each company in the Open Handset Alliance has a different customization, letting you choose a phone that is built up the way you want.
  • T-Mobile is cheaper. A lot cheaper. Check out their plans and weep. Like BlackBerrys over Android phones? Verizon has better customer service, and Sprint is faster, with WiMAX already rolled out in several cities. If you have an iPhone, you know that AT&T connects calls about as often as the Cubs win games. Which is not often. Not often at all. I’m not even a baseball fan and I know this analogy fits.

    • Seven (More) Reasons to Ditch Your iPhone | TechWatch | Fast Company.

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    Written by Admin

    August 20th, 2009 at 3:26 pm

    Posted in Politics, Technology

    What is the failture rate of various video game systems?

    with 117 comments

    Xbox 360 Failure Rate Is 54.2%

    PS3 (11%) and Wii (7%)

    “The Seattle PI Blog is reporting that a soon to be published Game Informer survey finally shows the failure rate of XBOX 360s: 54%! The survey also shows the rates of failure for the PS3 (11%) and Wii (7%). Impressively, only 4% of respondents said they wouldn’t buy a new 360 because of hardware failures.”

    Slashdot Games Story | Xbox 360 Failure Rate Is 54.2%.

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    Written by Admin

    August 20th, 2009 at 3:23 pm

    Posted in Entertainment, Technology

    iPhone / AT&T Satisfaction Survey Results

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    97% of iPhone owners are satisfied with the device while over half are NOT satisfied with AT&T service according to a recent survey:

    - Owners of Apple’s new iPhone 3GS love the device, but more than half of them hate AT&T, the smartphone’s exclusive mobile carrier in the U.S., according to a just-released survey.

    “There’s no indication that Apple’s AT&T problem is going away,” said Paul Carton, research director at ChangeWave Research. “The better consumers feel about their iPhones, the worse they feel about AT&T.”

    Carton said that the latest ChangeWave survey, which polled nearly 200 owners of Apple’s newest iPhone model, the 3GS, showed a “near-perfect satisfaction rating” for the product. More than eight of every ten iPhone 3GS owners said they were “very satisfied” with the smartphone, while another 17% said they were “somewhat satisfied.”

    “Extraordinary,” is how Carton interpreted the 97% total. “That’s the highest ratings we have ever had for any smartphone, including previous iPhones,” he said.

    iPhone owners love Apple’s smartphone, hate AT&T, survey says.

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    Written by Admin

    August 20th, 2009 at 7:20 am

    Posted in Random Facts

    Highway that doesn’t allow motorized vehicles?

    with 108 comments

    The only state highway in the U.S. that prohibits motorized vehicles is M-185 on Mackinaw Island in Michigan. You can travel on foot, bicycle or horse.

    Amazing Fact Generator ».

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    Written by Admin

    August 19th, 2009 at 11:10 pm

    Posted in Transportation

    Break Dancing – Health

    with 99 comments

    Like many high-impact sports, break dancing can lead to long-term health issues, including (no joke) Breaker’s Thumb, Break Dancer’s Pulmonary Embolism, and Break Dancer’s Fracture of the Fifth Metatarsal.

    Amazing Fact Generator ».

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    Written by Admin

    August 19th, 2009 at 11:09 pm

    Posted in Culture, Science, Sports

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