On 2025-05-03 02:07, Lawrence D'Oliveiro wrote:
On Fri, 2 May 2025 23:12:17 +0200, Carlos E.R. wrote:
On 2025-05-02 03:09, Lawrence D'Oliveiro wrote:
On Fri, 2 May 2025 02:37:08 +0200, Carlos E.R. wrote:
On 2025-05-01 23:48, Lawrence D'Oliveiro wrote:
On Thu, 1 May 2025 23:01:02 +0200, Carlos E.R. wrote:
I'm certain that bank applications would refuse to run on such a >>>>>>> system, same as they refuse to run if the phone is rooted.
Not sure what the point of such refusal is. Given the standard Linux >>>>>> sandboxing facilities, how would they even tell?
Their point is that they can be sure of their view of security.
Whatever it is they’re checking, they’re just fooling themselves.
That's irrelevant.
Reality does tend to be irrelevant to ideology, doesn’t it?
But then, the feeling is mutual.
You get it wrong. Your interpretation of security and how things
should be done is irrelevant. The interpretation by bankers is what
matters. We either follow their rules, or there are no banking apps in phones.
On 2025-05-03, Carlos E.R. wrote:
On 2025-05-03 02:07, Lawrence D'Oliveiro wrote:
On Fri, 2 May 2025 23:12:17 +0200, Carlos E.R. wrote:
On 2025-05-02 03:09, Lawrence D'Oliveiro wrote:
On Fri, 2 May 2025 02:37:08 +0200, Carlos E.R. wrote:That's irrelevant.
On 2025-05-01 23:48, Lawrence D'Oliveiro wrote:
On Thu, 1 May 2025 23:01:02 +0200, Carlos E.R. wrote:
I'm certain that bank applications would refuse to run on such a >>>>>>>> system, same as they refuse to run if the phone is rooted.
Not sure what the point of such refusal is. Given the standard Linux >>>>>>> sandboxing facilities, how would they even tell?
Their point is that they can be sure of their view of security.
Whatever it is they’re checking, they’re just fooling themselves. >>>>
Reality does tend to be irrelevant to ideology, doesn’t it?
But then, the feeling is mutual.
You get it wrong. Your interpretation of security and how things
should be done is irrelevant. The interpretation by bankers is what
matters. We either follow their rules, or there are no banking apps in
phones.
It ought to be illegal and stopped by courts, lest they someday find a
way to do that even on desktop computers "Oh, we see you removed the
bundled OS from Redmond and changed 'secure boot' settings. So you can't access the 'homebanking' on the web!".
On Tue, 6 May 2025 08:28:02 -0700, John Ames wrote:
This is my local haunt. Wonderful place - nice folks, pleasingly
esoteric selection, and just the right lost-in-the-stacks ambience
https://thebookeryplacerville.com/
Fact and Fiction is nowhere near that large. However
https://www.onlyinyourstate.com/experiences/montana/montana-valley- bookstore-100000-books-mt
If you're claustrophobic you might start to question the integrity of the shelves. If you're really brave you can go down to the cellar, turning
lights on as you go. Please trun them off as you leave if nobody else is there.
The owner lives in the back so most times you ring the old fashioned bell
on a Dutch door and she appears to take your money. If you're thirsty
after your search there's a bar down the street but it's not exactly a hip fern bar.
On Tue, 6 May 2025 11:57:57 +0200, Carlos E.R. wrote:
Sure. But ebooks are cheaper than paper, specially if you have to ship
them across the pond. Once I bought a paper book 2nd hand from a shop in
NY. Book, 1$. Shipping, 8$. That convinced me to buy an ebook reader.
And ebooks never get out of print.
I've wondered how e-books have affected book sales. A couple have went out
of business but there still is a shop in town than handles used
paperbacks. They sell for half the cover price and you get a quarter of
the price for the books you bring in. You can't do that with digital.
There had been a shop that did the same with CDs but they went under a
long time ago when music went digital.
The first one I bought was expensive. One or two years later, they went
down to 1/3 or so.
Amazon has a cheaper tier with ads on the screen saver. The ads don't pop
up when you're reading so I go for those. Part was a strategy to undercut Kobo and Nook.
I can not imagine myself putting a SIM on one. Each SIM costs money
here. I have a tablet that accepts SIMs, I never put one. I found that
out when I saw my cleaning lady answering a phone call with a big tablet
she fished out of her bag. She then explained that her iphone had been
stolen at her work place (she cleaned at an hotel). :-D
That was the thing with that generation of Kindles. If you bought the 3G model, which wasn't that much more expensive, it came with the SIM build
in. I don't even see a slot to access it. You didn't need a contract with
a carrier like you would with a tablet. I don't know how they handled different regions. At the time Verizon was about the only game in town so Amazon must have had an arrangement with them but in other areas it would
be another carrier. I can see why they dropped the option and went to wi-
fi only. It would be a mess now as carriers have expanded. My wireless wi-
fi hotspot is Verizon but my phone is T-Mobile, or Mint actually, although T-Mobile bought Mint. I don't know why Verizon doesn't have a prepaid option.
The TomTom navigator did that, too. There was a SIM card inside and they
had a slow and limited internet connection, but which they claimed
worked in all of Europe, at a time when this was expensive, before the council mandated cheap roaming inside the EU. They would not use it for
map updates, though, that had to be done via a computer.
I think I had to pay a yearly subscription, but far cheaper than a phone would be. When that gadget broke down, the next one used a BT connection
to my phone, which failed a lot. But it also has WiFi, and I managed to
buy a cheap dongle that provides WiFi in the car.
On Mon, 5 May 2025 22:50:45 -0000 (UTC), Peter Flass -- Iron Spring
Software wrote:
I've still got my original Kindle, a first- or second-gen model with an
actual keyboard. Amazing it still works, but I like it because it's so
small and light, and has terrific battery life.
https://www.amazon.com/Kindle-Keyboard-Free-Wi-Fi-Display/dp/B004HZYA6E
That's the oldest one I have. It still works although 3G is gone. I
bought a case for it that flips around to turn it into an easel. I've
got some programming books on it and it's handy to put next to the
computer. I have to retrain so I don't try to swipe to turn the page.
On 6 May 2025 04:37:09 GMT rbowman <bowman@montana.com> wrote:
Hopefully they won't step on a local indie bookstore's territory.
https://factandfictionbooks.com/
It's a little too hip for my taste but I do like that they have managed
to survive through the years.
This is my local haunt. Wonderful place - nice folks, pleasingly
esoteric selection, and just the right lost-in-the-stacks ambience :)
https://thebookeryplacerville.com/
On 2025-05-07, Carlos E.R. <robin_listas@es.invalid> wrote:
[having an embedded SIM]
The TomTom navigator did that, too. There was a SIM card inside and they
had a slow and limited internet connection, but which they claimed
worked in all of Europe, at a time when this was expensive, before the
council mandated cheap roaming inside the EU. They would not use it for
map updates, though, that had to be done via a computer.
I think I had to pay a yearly subscription, but far cheaper than a phone
would be. When that gadget broke down, the next one used a BT connection
to my phone, which failed a lot. But it also has WiFi, and I managed to
buy a cheap dongle that provides WiFi in the car.
The positioning is using a GNSS (GPS/Galileo/Glonass) which is a
receive-only radio. Cellular data may provide traffic information - I do
not know how much data bandwidth that requires. In many cars, there is a built-in cellular data that may be used for mechanical health checks,
crash detection and related emergency communications, but if your NAV subsystem is an aftermarket TomTom, it probably cannot interface with
the car's native systems.
On Wed, 7 May 2025 22:25:01 +0200, Carlos E.R. wrote:
It saddens me a lot seeing that paper book shops are unable to also sell
ebooks. I go to the shops to find new interesting books, but I can not
buy them there! They do the job of convincing me to buy a certain book,
then they can not benefit! I have to go to the online shop instead.
I don't really know why "used" ebooks can not be resold. Maybe the
conditions, the regulations, prohibit that, but technically, it is
perfectly feasible. It is a file, after all.
Amazon uses a DRM scheme but that can be broken. I think there's a way you can 'lend' and e-book to someone else. The library's e-books are delivered via Amazon but I think you have other choices. I don't know how the bookkeeping works but they treat an e-book like a physical book where
there's only one copy. You check it out and nobody else can get it until
you return it or the loan expires.
I can shop for new books inside the Kobo reader. When I finish an ebook
it is possible I get an offer to buy a new one, and I can get previews.
Commercials, no, I don't have them.
kindle does that in spades. You can also review the book. I read a lot of series and it always points you to the next one when you finish. I haven't tried it yet but they recently have come up with summaries. The trend for lesser known authors is series. Mackey Chandler's 'April' series is 14
books. Sometimes an author will still be working on books in the projected series and a recap or 'previously on' would be handy.
Some of the ads on Amazon, Netflix, and FreeVee can get a little old.
Several times they've run the same ad back to back in the same break. They also use the operant conditioning style reward schedule. Sometimes a show will be uninterrupted. The next episode might have ads every few minutes. Gotta keep the rats guessing. With rats it is a reward though. Partial reinforcement tends to work better than a reward every time. They can't figure out the schedule and will keep pressing the lever figuring they'll
get a treat sooner or later.
On Thu, 8 May 2025 14:17:27 +0200, Carlos E.R. wrote:
I wondered, though, if an ebook can be resold or transferred to another
user, legally, ie, keeping the DRM. Something similar to what a library
does.
https://booksrun.com/blog/news-on-reselling-ebooks/
The article is very old. afaik Amazon hasn't implemented any resale plan.
https://www.amazon.com/gp/help/customer/display.html?nodeId=201014950
Stephan Kinsella has written about the problem and copyright in general.
When you buy a physical book, you own the book. You can sell the physical book, but you can't copy it and sell copies. With electronic media you
have a license to the content but there isn't a physical entity. You don't own the epub, modi, awz, file.
https://phys.org/news/2009-10-amazon-deleted-orwell.html
Rather ironic that they snatched '1984' back. With Kindle Unlimited I can 'borrow' a large number of titles. When I have 'read' them I 'return' the book and it's removed from the device. That makes sense and I haven't paid for the content.
i asked an author how that worked from his end. He hadn't thought about it and said he would research it but never got back to me. Many of the books
I read fall into the Kindle Unlimited plan or I can buy them, usually for
a nominal amount, $5 or so. I wanted to know if he received the same
payment either way since Id rather support an author I enjoy. I don't
think any of the authors I read are turning into millionaires for their efforts.
Neal Stephenson tried the series deal and got quite a bit of negative reviews. It's in the unlimited plan now but when 'Polestan' came out last year I bought it for $14.99. It wasn't clear that it was a series and the story line was not resolved at all. People who had read his previous
books, which tend to be long and convoluted, thought it was a transparent ploy to make more money. I don't think the second book is out yet but I didn't like the first half enough to read it, even for free.
On Thu, 8 May 2025 14:17:27 +0200, Carlos E.R. wrote:
I wondered, though, if an ebook can be resold or transferred to another
user, legally, ie, keeping the DRM. Something similar to what a library
does.
https://booksrun.com/blog/news-on-reselling-ebooks/
The article is very old. afaik Amazon hasn't implemented any resale plan.
i asked an author how that worked from his end.
On Thu, 8 May 2025 21:15:01 -0000 (UTC), John Levine wrote:
Some of my books are in those unlimited digital libraries. If I've
gotten any royalties, I'd need a microscope to see them.
Certainly not 'Internet for Dummies' :)
According to rbowman <bowman@montana.com>:
On Thu, 8 May 2025 21:15:01 -0000 (UTC), John Levine wrote:
Some of my books are in those unlimited digital libraries. If I've
gotten any royalties, I'd need a microscope to see them.
Certainly not 'Internet for Dummies' :)
I got plenty of royalties from sales of the book itself and the many things they
made out of it like combo books and desk calendars, but not from the online libraries where the user pays one fee which is then split out to all the books
they might look at during the year.
I also get some random stautory royalties. Earlier this year my Dutch photocopying
royalty was 0,36 €. Time to look at yacht catalogs.
I wish I could find an RPN calculator. I just can't get my head
around infix for anything but the most simple of calculations.
Oh well, there's always dc...
There are 16C and 41C apps for android.
On 2025-05-01 15:37, vallor wrote:
It might be helpful if the Linux phone had the capability to
run android applications, so that one would still be able
to (say) authenticate with one's bank.
I'm certain that bank applications would refuse to run on such a system, >same as they refuse to run if the phone is rooted.
Rooting a phone (or "rooting" in Android) gives the user administrative privileges over the operating system. While this offers greater control,
it also entails security risks that banking applications find
unacceptable:
I've never run across a bank app that wouldn't run on a rooted phone.
If your bank pulls that sort of nonsense, it's time to find a different
bank.
On Mon, 12 May 2025 23:09:00 +0200, Carlos E.R. wrote:
Rooting a phone (or "rooting" in Android) gives the user administrative
privileges over the operating system. While this offers greater control,
it also entails security risks that banking applications find
unacceptable:
And yet they allow access to their websites on any common-or-garden
browser running on any common-or-garden PC, regardless of whether the user has administrative access to the PC or not.
Why this paternalistic attitude only to users of mobile phones, but not
PCs?
On Mon, 12 May 2025 23:09:00 +0200, Carlos E.R. wrote:
Rooting a phone (or "rooting" in Android) gives the user administrative
privileges over the operating system. While this offers greater control,
it also entails security risks that banking applications find
unacceptable:
And yet they allow access to their websites on any common-or-garden
browser running on any common-or-garden PC, regardless of whether the user has administrative access to the PC or not.
Why this paternalistic attitude only to users of mobile phones, but not
PCs?
On Tue, 13 May 2025 09:52:13 +0100, Nuno Silva wrote:
If someone manages to include something that allows, say, some sort of
TPM and/or secure boot-based validation from within the browser - and
W3C's history with DRM suggests that might end up happening - they might
well start doing that. "You changed your computer's OS from the
OEM-installed one. You cannot use our 'homebanking' from a rooted
computer.", "You uninstalled or disabled the OEMs driver update tool,
your system might not be secure, 'homebanking' will not work.", etc,
etc.
Slightly different, but Amazon Music balked at playing content with Brave
on Linux saying it wasn't an up to date Chrome. I then tried Firefox which tried to install some sort of DRM plugin that failed. So, I guess no
Amazon Music if you've rooted your computer. (the box did come with
Windows 11 Pro that I promptly overwrote with Ubuntu)
On Tue, 13 May 2025 22:03:33 +0200, Carlos E.R. wrote:
Anyway, I just tried in Firefox under Linux. It is playing, after saying
no to subscribing (so it is just the basic option with Amazon Prime). I
have Widevine Content Decryption Module provided by Google Inc. and
OpenH264 Video Codec provided by Cisco Systems, Inc.
Okay. Probably not something I'm going to bother figuring out. I was only curious because I get email saying I'm not using Amazon music. jango.com
or youtube playlists work for me.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9WXsdApQIY4
On 2025-05-05 09:14, maus wrote:
On 2025-05-04, rbowman <bowman@montana.com> wrote:
On Sun, 4 May 2025 14:16:39 +0200, Carlos E.R. wrote:
I use Chrome on the few occasions those things happen and I don't feel >>>> like walking, considering that here you need an appointment to enter the >>>> bank office. Or, phone their agent place.
At least in the US you can walk in without an appointment. It's never been >>> more than a few minutes before someone sees you. The exception was during >>> the covid lockdown when the lobby was closed.
I very seldom have to go to the bank anyway. Everything is set up as
direct deposit or automated payment. Day to day I use cash, and get a few >>> hundred from the ATM as needed. The exception is using a card at gas
stations for the convenience. I've never had the need for online banking >>> or an app on the phone.
Pinoccio!
The nightmare happened in Iberia last week, a niece of one on my friends
was there, no money, no cards, and nobody uses cash.
The bazaars known here as "chinos", because they are mostly owned and
staffed by Chinese people, prefer cash. They switched to cards during
Covid, but now they are back to a minimum amount to accept cards. I
also know some cafeterias that have a minimum.
But even having cash on the Gran Apag¢n day and you had trouble to
purchase things, because the cash register machines were down. They
could not look up the price of things in supermarkets.
Some places resorted to "you pay me back tomorrow".
| Sysop: | Tetrazocine |
|---|---|
| Location: | Melbourne, VIC, Australia |
| Users: | 12 |
| Nodes: | 8 (0 / 8) |
| Uptime: | 14:34:45 |
| Calls: | 173 |
| Files: | 21,502 |
| Messages: | 79,265 |