March 2009 Blog Posts
Today I received notification from my bank that my information had been compromised in a data breach of Heartland Payment Systems in late January. While I am relieved that my own data has not (yet) been compromised, this latest incident further exacerbates the ridiculous manner in which they are handled. Affected parties are not presented with detailed information on how or why the breach occurs, nor are they held accountable for the countless millions that are lost--not with fraud, but with credit card issuers who have to reissue cards, PR to explain customers the situation, and the money lost by...
As I had mentioned in my previous posts, the biggest barrier to purchasing a Mac had been price. For the hardware that you get it seems awfully expensive when you match that up to a comparably equipped PC. One of the benefits of a Mini, however, are its ultra-compact size, energy efficiencies, and more importantly how quiet it is. I have a 9800GTX+ in my PC and the box sounds like a wind tunnel with all the fans that are in it to keep it cool.
But does it have any guts? I got the lower end model at $599, and...
Last week I posted about picking up a Mac Mini for dev work. After a week of use (I only powered up my PC to play TF2 last night), I've come away with a better feel for the Mac Experience.
As much as the Apple Fanboys tout OS X's intuitiveness, I have to say that Macs would be easier to use if they were my first computer. That might sound strange, even derogatory, but there are a lot of things that don't translate well when coming from a Windows-centric view. Like I had mentioned last week, the whole deal with...
Yesterday I made the leap. I had been pondering making the jump to a Mac ever since the Mac Mini made its debut a few years ago, but it hasn't been until the iPhone came out that I started seriously looking into it. The Mac's increased popularity and market share haven't hurt either, but it's viability as a development platform has certainly increased because of the appeal for iPhone apps.
The barrier to entry has always been price. The Mac Mini was a tempting diminutive box to get, but its hardware was dated and it wasn't getting the regular hardware refreshes...
News came in earlier today of Obama's pick for trade secretary, Ron Kirk. Surprise (or no surprise) that he too owes America nearly $10K in back taxes. He's the latest of Obama's cabinet picks to join the ranks of tax evasionists in the new administration. Tim Giethner, Tom Daschle, and Nancy Killefer all had their tax problems brought to headline news, but it has only been Geithner who has had the audacity to stick through the Senate proceedings to be comfirmed.
What's going on here?! It seems like Obama's surrounding himself with a bunch of crooks. The message he seems to...