notjackma

Walk down the tourist area of Haight Street towards the park and you'll see pieces of cardboard and what looks like dog poop or human faeces smeared all over the sidewalk. Outside every store is someone smoking marijuana. It's a terrible place to go for a walk with a baby or kids.

San Francisco is the filthiest city I've ever worked in.

Literally.

How many of you reading this are in San Francisco and live in an apartment building? Go and check the trash room.

You'll probably find that Recology emptied out the bins today but left garbage, even if tied up neatly in trash bags, piled up against the wall or door.

Disgusting and unsanitary. What happened to common sense? What happened to people doing their job? Seriously, is there some law which says that trashmen are not allowed to place trash bags into a wheelie bin for expensive compacting trucks to get to work?

San Francisco is one of the worst run cities I have ever seen.

Many mobile developers defend Apple taking their 30% cut.

Crazy, but true.

Uber really just provides technical infrastructure

Would it be accurate to say centralised technical infrastructure? Simply transferring the data to the US is already probably breaking local data protection laws. I don't think Uber operates a franchise model with local infrastructure so countries are right to be concerned that names, addresses, credit cards and movement of individuals is being stored in a foreign country and open to data-mining and other abuse.

This could be it. Amazing what "celebrities" are charging for product placement.

https://twitter.com/BikiniRobotArmy/status/54688646593893171...

This is great when you consider today's culture of planned obsolescence and the environmental damage that results.

Yes, I'm pointing fingers at Apple here, because they charge $1000-$1500 for laptops that have proprietary hard-drive connectors and soldered ram.

Clearly Tim Cook and senior management are in a bind.

They keep telling people they're geniuses ('only Apple could do this') and industry leaders in environmental practices.

The BBC film has shown this to be false so either Tim Cook is a pathological liar or he doesn't have a clue what goes on in the supply chain. Meaning he's not the genius the fawning press like to make him out to be.

The best quote in the film is when an Indonesian supplier is asked what he thinks of Apple's envieonmental policy. His response: "Apple bullshit. Bullshit Apple.". The subtitles make this an instant internet meme.

Yes, the suppliers are faking the hours. They show this in the film.

    magnet:?xt=urn:btih:76291D1E48A0930CD649A42E3C7BD82F78E5EE16&dn=panorama+s62e44+apples+broken+promises+hdtv+x264+ftp+ettv&tr=udp%3A%2F%2Fopen.demonii.com%3A1337%2Fannounce
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It's worse.

The documentary shows how Foxconn and Pegatron fake payroll slips so that long hours don't show up.

93% compliance is rubbish. Workers are forced to sign forms saying they consent to night shifts and overtime, when in fact overtime is mandatory.

Apple's required reporting is nothing more than window-dressing; lipstick on a pig.

Apple's release schedule of one big yearly event and 10 million units ready to ship on day 1 must bear some of the blame. Near impossible demands are being placed on manufacturers desperate to keep a lucrative contract, who in turn drive workers like slaves.

Good spot catching that Apple's own documents don't stack up with their claims. But this is how the company operates as a whole - sell the sizzle, not the steak. I think they simply thought that nobody would actually bother to verify their claims.

Done, thanks for the heads up.

The 'code of conduct' is a sham:

Foxconn and Pegatron issue fake payroll slips to hide long hours, threaten workers to tick boxes saying they consent to working nights, overtime is mandatory, ID cards are illegally confiscated leaving workers trapped at the plants.

The employee education program is a joke. Employees are herded into a hall, shown some slides and then asked to take a test. The answers are shouted out and repeated in unison by everyone. Thus everyone scores 100% and passes.

This is a letter which Tim Cook et al issued to Apple UK staff after the BBC's documentary unit, Panorama, went undercover into the iPhone factories.

Terrible working conditions in continue to exist, contrary to public statements made by Tim Cook, and the supply chain continues to make use of child labor wittingly or unwittingly.

When an Indonesian tin supplier to Apple is asked about Apple's environmental policies his response was "Bullshit Apple. Apple Bullshit".

[1] BBC iPlayer - http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b04vs348

[2] Magnet

    magnet:?xt=urn:btih:76291D1E48A0930CD649A42E3C7BD82F78E5EE16&dn=panorama+s62e44+apples+broken+promises+hdtv+x264+ftp+ettv&tr=udp%3A%2F%2Fopen.demonii.com%3A1337%2Fannounce

Very funny and true... and it looks like fear (of getting emails hacked) has executives in Hollywood panicking now.

"Steve Carell’s North Korea Movie ‘Pyongyang’ Canceled in Wake of Sony Hack" http://www.thewrap.com/steve-carells-north-korea-movie-pyong...

It might never be released. Sony has pulled it from theatrical release and said there are no plans for video-on-demand or DVD release.

http://variety.com/2014/film/news/sony-cancels-theatrical-re...

Some people believe it is... this guy actually has a regular column at Forbes.

U.S. Should Make North Korea Pay for Sony Hack

Pyongyang has given the Obama administration no choice but to retaliate now by imposing sanctions or even an embargo.

http://www.thedailybeast.com/articles/2014/12/17/u-s-should-...

Seth Rogen is a bit of a coward. He picked an easy target in Kim given that North Korea is isolated and has no ability to do any real harm to him. Easy to mock somebody who can't get back at you.

Would he have dared to make a comedy mocking Mohammed the warlord turned prophet and 72 virgins in heaven? I guess he was smart enough to figure out that life under police protection would have cramped his partying.

Oh, and Seth is a total prima-donna, witness his recent tirade against Cathay Pacific because they wouldn't allow his wife's dog onto the plane due to the breed being more susceptible to death during flight.

The headlines go around the world and people will just accept it as the truth.

If there is a retraction it will be in a year's time and buried under an ad for washing powder on page 17.

You simply don't need evidence anymore when the media, unwittingly perhaps, construct the narrative for you.

Why is the New York Times held in such high esteem? Was there a period of time when it truly was a paper of record? These days it seems like the name Pravda on the Hudson is well deserved.

I think ordinary folk should find it scary that the price of oil is a complete sham.

Price of a barrel of oil has fallen 50% in the space of two to three months based on the policy decisions of OPEC. Has demand suddenly collapsed? I don't think so, anything you can bring onto the market, China will gobble up.

Of course, the price at the pump comprises a lot of taxes too, but it seems evident that ordinary folk are getting ripped off and that the price of oil is not only lining the pockets of the Saudis but also a geopolitical tool.

How much money did he start with? Why not publish his complete trading history? With these kind of stories we are never given the actual data and I think it's dangerous as it encourages others to speculate with money they can't afford.

There was a story on CNN yesterday where a person said instead of paying off their student loan they had invested in the stock market and they were doing going great. Of course they neglect to mention that he started investing in 2009 and not in 2007.

I can't imagine the neck strain that's going to occur.

I was wondering about this too and the impact on your eyes. For a 39" monitor it's recommended you sit over 5ft away, so the optimal desk environment for such a large monitor will be interesting.

http://www.rtings.com/info/television-size-to-distance-relat...

Western companies have no problen doing business with China or Russia.

If you have a problem then that's on you. The politics in China has not stopped entrepeneurs from heading east.

You may be right. It's often described as being at the cross roads of east and west. It's north of both Iraq and Iran which for most people would not be Europe.

It doesn't matter what you want your kids exposed to... because there are activists who are working with politicians in most Western countries to totally change sex educations classes.

For example, in the UK, teachers are to tell kids as young as 13, which is below the age of consent:

"normal behaviour includes taking an interest in pornography, having sexually explicit conversations, using the internet to chat online and consenting to oral or penetrative sex with the same or opposite gender."

Or kids as young as 9:

" So-called “green behaviours” are defined as those that “reflect safe and healthy sexual development”. For children aged nine to 13, green behaviours include “solitary masturbation” and “use of sexual language”."

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/education/educationnews/11209109/...

It's interesting to note that that the Eurovision song contest includes Russia, Israel and central Asian states, including even Azerbaijan. Perhaps this is an example of soft power projection from the EU "project" of a political union and the creation of a supra-national state...

Don't they say the same thing about China and it's rule of law, or lack of? Yet Western businesses flock there.

If I were an investor and an entrepreneur gave me all these reasons for not entering the Russian or Chinese market, as well as refusing to do business with companies from these countries, I would quickly show them the door.

China has none of the above and is now the world's largest economy. Doesn't seem to be an impediment to doing business, does it?

http://www.marketwatch.com/story/its-official-america-is-now...

The founder of Huawei was in the PLA, and this is often used to bash the company.

Why is it ok to serve country A, B, C and then go into business... but if you serve country X,Y,Z you're suddenly untrustworthy?

What next? Make business decisions based upon the sexual preferences of the CEO?

Zurich = Central location in Europe, natives speak multiple languages, science and R&D already there (pharmaceutical).

Wow, you must know something the rest of the world doesn't.

If you have evidence that Russian troops shot down flight MH-17 then you should present it to the Dutch parliament and the United Nations.

Otherwise, like the rest of us, you should wait for investigators to finish their work.