iPhone Bondage

For the last few years I have silently accepted the control of my dark overlords at Apple in their evil union with AT&T.  Their draconian rules, contracts, and crappy customer service and network was kind of worth it to have a state of the art phone, that made other phones turn green with envy.  But the latest generation of Android mobile phones have finally allowed me to escape the evil clutches of Apple once and for all, and I tell you, I ain't never going back in there.

I think the iPhone story in the US is an almost perfect example of what happens when two corporations get together in an environment where consumer protection laws are weak and hardly enforced.  Two year contracts, penalty fees, a lack of choice, price fixing, DRM and even complete control over the software you are allowed to buy or download onto your phone.  Being told I couldn't have insurance, being told if anything went wrong I had to drive out of my way to find an Apple store.  My list of grievances was growing longer by the week.  And then there is always the carrot Apple dangles as rumors spread of their next great innovation. 

Early this month I decided to make the change.  My iPhone 3GS was not retaining charge as long as it should, and I was getting sick of having such a crappy camera on the phone.  My first plan was to simply buy an iPhone 4, but according to the rules I was a few weeks too early so I was to be charged $250 penalty for the early upgrade, and that simply wasn't going to happen.  I thought about going to Verizon, but you're still shackled to all the Apple rules and policies, and don't have simultaneous voice and data.  I put in an application to AT&T customer service for special permission for an early upgrade, but after a few days of deliberation my application was rejected; and I was sentenced to a flogging in the village square for my impertinence.  Okay, so that last bit isn't true, but they did tell me to take a hike.

Now in fairness to AT&T, they did give me permission to early upgrade to any non-Apple product, and to sweeten the deal they reduced by bill by $10 a month, gave me unlimited free texting, on top of my unlimited data plan.  On that basis I started to research the Android phones they carry.

When I took a look at the latest offerings and was pretty impressed with the massive AMOLED screen on the Infuse 4G, and upon more research decided I could probably live with it fairly well given that pretty much every application I used on the iPhone is available on the Android where most apps seem cheaper or free.

Escaping Apple

Escaping the clutches of Apple isn't that easy, especially if you've been a good little minion and have been purchasing all your music from iTunes with that nasty DRM (copy protection) on the music, but thankfully I had long since stopped doing that, and all my recent music purchases have been from Amazon, who use a standard MP3 file format that is completely portable.

My iPhone had somehow confused itself with my contacts, and had taken to duplicating some or all of them when I synced it, and even the application I had purchased to fix the problem had not really cleaned up my contacts properly.  So when I purchased my Samsung Infuse 4G, the AT&T staff were not able to copy the data off my SIM card.  This proved to be a minor annoyance, but an hour getting my Gmail contact list back in line proved to be all that was necessary to ensure my contacts list was up to date and on my phone.

I have recently started using the excellent Amazon cloud to store my music so pretty much all my music off my computer and iPhone was already on the cloud.  There is an Android App that allows you to play your cloud music right off the phone, but so that you can still listen to the music on a plane the same app will sync the cloud to your phone in the background so the music exists locally as well as remotely.

As to the phone itself, I can see now why iPhone rose to greatness so quickly.  It is unspeakably simple to use, Apple realized that the key to success was not simply making a kick ass phone, they had to make it simple and intuitive, and in fairness, they achieved that.  But like anything you dumb down to the lowest common denominator, that simplicity also translated to a lack of choice and functionality.  Android gives you way more choice, and this does make things harder, but for for me ultimately more rewarding.

I spent many hours playing with the phone, configuring it just how I liked it and to my relief it can do just about anything my iPhone could do, but with many advantages that outweigh anything I might have lost.

What I Love

Clearly the screen on the Infuse is just spectacular.  At 4.5 inches and in AMOLED glory it is like watching a small HD TV.  I've watched TV shows and movies on this thing and actually don't feel like I am looking at an animated postage stamp.

Some of the graphics, animated wallpaper for example, are just incredible; truly beautiful.  This graphical prowess also extends to the camera that takes excellent pictures at 8MP and video at 720P.

Together with the graphical loveliness of the phone the CPU delivers smooth and fluid operation.  With only a few minor exceptions, the phone doesn't keep me waiting.

This phone is way faster in data speed than the old iPhone, and it seems to have a better signal than my iPhone in most places I have traveled to.

I love the easy connectivity to the Amazon cloud.  It's like the iCloud, except some bastard corporation isn't setting draconian copy protection rules and being shitty about where I can keep my data.

I love the customizable nature of the phone.  For example the device ships with three different keyboards for text entry, each working very differently from the others.  And in fact I purchased an even better one for $1.99, that has incredibly intuitive and AI predictive text.

I think the voice recognition is pretty good, still not good enough to completely replace typing, but good nontheless.

From what I've seen on the Android market place, apps are far more freely available on than at the Apple store where so much stuff costs 99c and up.  In fact I pretty much have every app I used to have on the iPhone, and I didn't have to spend a penny to achieve that.  Also with Android if you buy and app and hate it, you can uninstall it within 15 minutes and not be charged.

I think the phone is very good looking, shiny black on one side like big iPhone 4, and what they call caviar black on the back, with an interesting texture.

Of course because this phone is not made by Apple, I get to use websites with Flash if I want to.

What I Dislike

I do miss the size of my old phone, clearly though if I want a massive screen like that, common sense tells you it's going to be bigger than an iPhone, although it is only 8.9mm thick.  It's not hard to carry the phone in the pocket, but one does have to be a little bit careful when holding it to ensure it is not dropped.  Because there are four touch keys on the bottom of the device, you have to be careful where you put your grip too.

The speakerphone is not as good as the iPhone, but only marginally worse.  Having said that, the call quality is superior, so I can actually have a normal conversation without using the speakerphone.  I found the call quality of the iPhone so poor, I would use speakerphone all the time, and that simply isn't necessary any more.

Some of the Android applications are still not as good as the iPhone.  In fact it seems like some of the apps I've used are old versions of iPhone apps that have been ported.  But those are few and far between in fairness.  I am annoyed that at the time of writing Skype doesn't support video chat, and Netflix has not put out an app for the Android yet (at least not this Android).  Let's also not forget too how basic the Facebook app is.  Not cool, considering the power of the phone it should be way better.

I keep hearing about the 2.3 operating system, and I hope Samsung gives me an upgrade option down the road.  Time will tell on that.  I have not really researched what makes it so good, but I do like to have the latest OS as a general rule.

I miss the visual voicemail of the iPhone, and don't really understand why Android/AT&T are not offering that yet.  Seems like something they could charge some bullshit fee for, which I'd be (almost) happy to pay.

The phone ships with a cable to attach it to an HDMI cable.  Staying in a hotel that can be handy to watch movies or TV shows from services like HBO Go on a bigger screen.  Oddly though it wouldn't let me watch shows I had purchased from Samsung (with the gift card they gave me), on the big screen.  Unfortunately, the hotel I tried it in had poor WiFi and poor cell reception, so there was some buffering issues.  I'll have to assume it works better in other areas.

Conclusion

The Samsung Infuse 4G is awesome.  Plain and simple, it's a great phone with only a few minor flaws.  Whatever flaw you might pick on though is completely outweighed by what it brings to the table.  To me it is wonderful not to be tied to Apple any more.  No more DRM, no more syncing, no more being forced to download iTunes with that fucking horrific QuickTime they force you to install.  No more not being allowed to sync my phone to both my desktop and laptop PC.  No more draconian rules about upgrading, service (forced driving to an Apple store), not being able to have insurance against loss or damage.

I know that by the end of the year there will likely be an iPhone 5, and I'm sure it will be lovely.  But despite my former love of the iPhone (it was once arguably the best smartphone on the market), I just don't care what the iPhone 5 can do.  I am not willing to trade my soul for it.  The price of admission is too high, and my skepticism extends to products like the iCloud that only seek to further lock you in to their world.

In their joint corporate greed for money and control, AT&T and Apple took a great and revolutionary product and made it unpalatable for many people.  In the meantime a handful of major corporations began a race to kick Apples ass, and to me they have succeeded.  One can never predict the future, maybe one day the iPhone 8 will be so incredible nothing else will be able to touch it.  The truth though is that just like Mac vs PC, there are dozens of companies making PCs and similarly a lot of companies that make cell phones.  The Android operating system is a powerful weapon that unites the competition against Apple, and it seems hard to imagine that Apple has the power to continually fend off attacks in the long term while staying ahead of the curve.

My 30 day trial on the Samsung Infuse is coming to an end.  I am quite happy to hang on to this device for the next 20 months, then we'll see what's out there.

Michelle Bachmann

I was recently discussing some political issues with a Republican, and they made the statement that Sarah Palin was incredibly smart, which immediately set off some alarm bells given the obvious reality that Sarah Palin is a complete imbecile.  But in the way that Republicans do these days the person I was speaking with doubled down with their next statement.  "Say what you want about Palin, Michelle Bachmann is the one to watch; she is highly intelligent and Presidential..."

I was pretty floored by that statement, aware as I am of reality, but it made me wonder how many other people are out there harboring this misconception.  I decided to dig a little deeper and find some quotes from the woman herself, so we can evaluate her view of the world, her judgement and her fitness to rule over the most powerful country on the planet...

“Take this into consideration. If we look at American history, between 1942 and 1947, the data that was collected by the Census Bureau was handed over to the FBI and other organizations at the request of President Roosevelt, and that's how the Japanese were rounded up and put into the internment camps. I'm not saying that that's what the Administration is planning to do, but I am saying that private personal information that was given to the Census Bureau in the 1940s was used against Americans to round them up, in a violation of their constitutional rights, and put the Japanese in internment camps.” -Rep. Michele Bachmann, June 2009

This was part of her argument against giving the government census data.

“Carbon dioxide is portrayed as harmful. But there isn't even one study that can be produced that shows that carbon dioxide is a harmful gas.” -Rep. Michelle Bachmann, April, 2009

I wonder if Bachmann would be willing to prove this for us.

“There are hundreds and hundreds of scientists, many of them holding Nobel Prizes, who believe in intelligent design.” -Rep. Michele Bachmann, Oct. 2006

 In all fairness, I believe she said this on Make Shit Up Thursday...

“We’re in a state of crisis where our nation is literally ripping apart at the seams right now, and lawlessness is occurring from one ocean to the other. And we’re seeing the fulfillment of the Book of Judges here in our own time, where every man doing that which is right in his own eyes—in other words, anarchy.” – Senator Michele Bachmann, appearing as guest on radio program “Prophetic Views Behind The News”, March 6, 2004.

This is common among radical right wing religious nut jobs, the belief that the world is about to end, and that any kind of progress, change or modernizing of society is proof that such events are happening.  It is scary to imagine that someone who believes that the world is about to end, wants to run for office.  I wonder if their policies will be guided by that?  Slow down global warming?  Why try if the world is going to end?  Ensure that people retiring in 2030 will have social security available to them?  Ah, we'll all be in Heaven by then...

“I find it interesting that it was back in the 1970s that the swine flu broke out under another, then under another Democrat president, Jimmy Carter. I'm not blaming this on President Obama, I just think it's an interesting coincidence.” -Rep. Michele Bachmann, on the 1976 Swine Flu outbreak that happened when Gerald Ford, a Republican, was president, April 28, 2009.

Who even makes this kind of statement, even if it were historically true?  Perhaps someone who thinks that illness is a punishment from God.

“Listeners should rejoice right now, because there are believers all across your listening area that are praying now. And I would say that if you can’t attend the rally, you can pray. And God calls us to fall on our faces and our knees and cry out to Him and confess our sins. And I would just ask your listeners to do that now. Cry out to a Holy God. He wants to hear us, He will hear us if we will confess our sins and cry out to Him. Our children are worth it and obedience to God demands it.” — Senator Michele Bachmann, appearing as guest on radio program “Prophetic Views Behind The News”, March 6, 2004.

This was her rational response to a debate on same sex marriage.

“[Talking about gay marriage:] This is probably the biggest issue that will impact our state and our nation in the last, at least, thirty years.” — Senator Michele Bachmann, appearing as guest on radio program “Prophetic Views Behind The News”, March 20, 2004.

It's almost impossible to know what to say about this.  How can any sane human being care less what happens if two people in love get married consensually and as legal adults?

“And what a bizarre time we’re in, Jan, when a judge will say to little children that you can’t say the pledge of allegiance, but you must learn that homosexuality is normal and you should try it.” — Senator Michele Bachmann, appearing as guest on radio program “Prophetic Views Behind The News”, hosted by Jan Markell, KKMS 980-AM, March 6, 2004.

Another common trait among radical fundamentalists in America is the belief they have that the world and the country is out to get them.  Like they are being oppressed by forces of Satanism or Atheism and the whole country is going to Hell etc. etc.  I mean is any judge at all in this country forcing children to learn about homosexuality and/or try it?  Of course not.  It's back to the incredibly stupid notion that if you talk about homosexuality people will just turn gay.


“If you’re involved in the gay and lesbian lifestyle, it’s bondage. It is personal bondage, personal despair and personal enslavement.” — Senator Michele Bachmann, speaking at EdWatch National Education Conference, November 6, 2004.

“They aren’t just kind of gay-friendly, they are gay advocates at Proctor and Gamble… Here’s just a few other companies that support the pro-homosexual agenda. They include Levi-Strauss, American Airlines, Sarah Lee Bakery, Jaguar and LandRover.” — Senator Michele Bachmann, speaking at EdWatch National Education Conference, November 6, 2004.

“You have a teacher talking about his gayness. (The elementary school student) goes home then and says “Mom! What’s gayness? We had a teacher talking about this today.” The mother says “Well, that’s when a man likes other men, and they don’t like girls.” The boy’s eight. He’s thinking, “Hmm. I don’t like girls. I like boys. Maybe I’m gay.” And you think, “Oh, that’s, that’s way out there. The kid isn’t gonna think that.” Are you kidding? That happens all the time. You don’t think that this is intentional, the message that’s being given to these kids? That’s child abuse.” — Senator Michele Bachmann, speaking at EdWatch National Education Conference, November 6, 2004.

Any teacher telling kids what a gay person is, is now committing 'child abuse.'

“Normalization (of gayness) through desensitization. Very effective way to do this with a bunch of second graders, is take a picture of “The Lion King” for instance, and a teacher might say, “Do you know that the music for this movie was written by a gay man?” The message is: I’m better at what I do, because I’m gay.” — Senator Michele Bachmann, speaking at EdWatch National Education Conference, November 6, 2004.

“Don’t misunderstand. I am not here bashing people who are homosexuals, who are lesbians, who are bisexual, who are transgender. We need to have profound compassion for people who are dealing with the very real issue of sexual dysfunction in their life and sexual identity disorders.” — Senator Michele Bachmann, speaking at EdWatch National Education Conference, November 6, 2004.

Finally, if you'd like to see more of her craziness, feel free to watch and listen to her telling it how it is:

Like so many of her ilk she talks about the evils of government interference until it comes to all her personal beliefs (religious, social, and political).  When it comes to using the government machine like a sledge hammer to drive home her issues, she's all about that.  It's okay to use government to impose the 'right' policies and ideas, it's just wrong when liberals are allowing government to do something.  At that point it's simply evidence that government "doesn't work."

She objects to a government census in a conspiracy theory even Glen Beck dismissed as crazy, but wants our government to impose their will on something as fundamental as marriage.  She opposes sex education, but would probably leap for joy if prayer were in school instead.  She thinks Intelligent Design is another 'scientific' option that should be laid out for children to 'decide.'  Yet I suspect she would object to climate change being taught, or a religion class that focused on Islam.  She has pledged to bring down Planned Parenthood, despite all the valuable services they bring to millions of women that have nothing to do with abortion.  And she believes we are in the end times, and the world could end any minute now.  And to be be honest, if she were elected President of the United States, I'd be inclined to agree with her.

Political Bumper Stickers

When I was growing up in England, bumper stickers were fairly popular.  "My other car's a Porsche!" and other such 'humor.'  But somewhere in the 80s people began to realize that there were something tacky and unpleasant about attaching a piece of plastic to your car, and so the tradition quickly died out.

In America though the bumper sticker lives on, and political bumper stickers are still quite popular.  However, the one thing I cannot fathom is what would possess someone, in 2011 to still be driving around with a McCain / Palin sticker on their vehicle other than rank stupidity.  I mean it wasn't like that decrepit old man and the bimbo was ever a viable option for President in the first place, but to actually still believe in 2011, that our country would be better off if the old man were in charge is utter craziness.

This is what leaves me so incredulous when I see these stickers still on cars, it's the fact that not only was a person so misguided they would have supported that ticket in the first place, but now after all these years they still think that those couple of tards should have won!

I guess the only good thing about the McCain / Palin sticker on a vehicle is it saves me the bother of trying to spot the morons.  After all, if you have a McCain / Palin sticker on your car, you are a moron, plain and simple.  You might just as well get a bumper sticker that says, "I lack any kind of good judgement, and I'm a fucking idiot."  But I guess McCain / Palin sums it up more succinctly.

Land of the Free? Not for Poker Players

In 2006 the Bush administration allowed Bill Frist to slip unwanted and unwarranted language into an unrelated anti-terror bill designed to make it harder for legitimate foreign businesses to operate here in the United States.

The language in question made it very difficult for US banks to process transactions involving online gambling sites, including poker sites, yet oddly offering a loophole for horse race better.  Even more odd when Frist described his rationale in the context that gambling 'destroys families.'  Anyway this piece of law finally took effect recently, and now American banks are forced to spy on account holders and report 'suspicious' activity that may be related to online gaming to the authorities.

Last month all this came to a head when the Department of Justice and the FBI, presumably bored having solved all the crime in this country, decided to seize the domain names of the major online poker sites including Full Tilt and Poker Stars, effectively shutting them out of the US market, perhaps for good.

Online poker players, some of whom had tens of thousands of dollars held with these trusted international companies, found themselves unable to play and unable to access their money.

The fall out from this move was dire to say the least.  Millions of people all over America lost their hobby, many lost a valuable source of income, jobs were lost, accounts were frozen, and once again the United States government wasted valuable tax resources for no good reason, all while telling us we are so broke we have to lay off teachers and cut health care benefits from seniors.

After some negotiation Poker Stars obtained permission from the Department of Justice to release players' funds, and as of right now Full Tilt poker has failed to return money to American players.  And that's where poker legend Phil Ivey steps in.  As a paid spokesperson for Full Tilt, he has received some flak for their lack of effort to pay out.  Yesterday Ivey released as statement via Facebook that he was going to sue Full Tilt for failing to return his money, and he was going to sit out of the World Series of Poker this year; a huge sacrifice for a professional poker player.

It's a real clusterfuck, I tells ya.  While Republicans talk about less government interference, the fruits of their overbearing right wing crazy now comes back to bite us in the ass.  Like so many stupid Republican decisions, here we are paying the price for their ineptitude once again.

It is time to license, regulate and tax online poker.  Allow Americans to play the game they invented (okay so sure it's not entirely an American invention, but there is no question poker would not be as big or available in this format if it was not for American inventiveness!).  Tap into the real tax revenue available here to help our budget crisis.  And for the love of god, stop wasting tax dollars with stupid busts like this, if we are broke as the Republican party would have us believe, conserve money and spend it where it will do us some good, rather than harassing millions of good honest tax paying Americans.

Finally, thank you Phil Ivey for using your celebrity to draw attention to this asinine situation.