It's my life, you're just along for the ride!

I Keep My Phone on Silent to Protect My Own Sanity

Posted on August 23, 2012 by StevenTorresRamos

I’ve been doing this for about the same time and I have to agree it’s the way to go!

STR

At some point last year (or maybe two years ago?), I decided to abandon ringtones and alerts of all sorts, in favor of the mild buzz of a vibration. I don’t want to hear text messages or even phone calls come in—ever. I don’t want to constantly have my ear pricked for some sort of contact from the outside world.

I don’t want to hallucinate a text message chime. It makes me crazy. Crazed for communication. To check on my own time, at will, when I’m ready to be reached, is much more manageable.

Image via Nomad_Soul/Shutterstock

via I Keep My Phone on Silent to Protect My Own Sanity.

Posted in HowTo, Interesting, Opinion, tips | Leave a comment

Why passwords have never been weaker—and crackers have never been stronger | Ars Technica

Posted on August 22, 2012 by StevenTorresRamos

In late 2010, Sean Brooks received three e-mails over a span of 30 hours warning that his accounts on LinkedIn, Battle.net, and other popular websites were at risk. He was tempted to dismiss them as hoaxes—until he noticed they included specifics that werent typical of mass-produced phishing scams. The e-mails said that his login credentials for various Gawker websites had been exposed by hackers who rooted the sites servers, then bragged about it online; if Brooks used the same e-mail and password for other accounts, they would be compromised too.The warnings Brooks and millions of other people received that December werent fabrications. Within hours of anonymous hackers penetrating Gawker servers and exposing cryptographically protected passwords for 1.3 million of its users, botnets were cracking the passwords and using them to commandeer Twitter accounts and send spam. Over the next few days, the sites advising or requiring their users to change passwords expanded to include Twitter, Amazon, and Yahoo.

via Why passwords have never been weaker—and crackers have never been stronger | Ars Technica.

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iPhone Q1 2012 profit higher than Microsoft’s entire business

Posted on August 20, 2012 by StevenTorresRamos

Apple’s (AAPL) stock is soaring ahead of the company’s sixth-generation iPhone launch, and while its market capitalization is now well over double that of rival Microsoft (MSFT), Forbes on Sunday pulled an interesting snippet from a recent Vanity Fair piece. In the first calendar quarter of 2012, Apple’s revenue of $39.2 billion more than doubled Microsoft’s $17.41 billion in sales. The far more impressive stat, as the site noted, is that Apple took in $22.7 billion during the March quarter just from iPhone sales — meaning a single Apple product was responsible for 30% more revenue than Microsoft’s entire business. Apple’s “iPhone 5” is expected to launch next month and analysts are tripping over themselves to find new ways to call it the biggest product launch in Apple history. It will be interesting to revisit this revenue comparison after the holiday quarter, when Apple will launch the new iPhone and Microsoft will finally release its next-generation Windows 8 operating system.

via iPhone Q1 2012 profit higher than Microsoft’s entire business.

Posted in Apple, Interesting, MSFT, Tech | Leave a comment

Gazelle Will Give You Cash For Your iPhone Without Leaving You Phoneless For a Month

Posted on August 20, 2012 by StevenTorresRamos

About half of iPhone users are having the “I want to sell my iPhone before the new one comes out but I dont want to be phoneless for a month” dilemma right now. But there is a solution to that horrible first-world problem—Gazelle is giving out price locks and wont make you fork over your phone until October 1.What that means is that you can get top dollar, guaranteed, on your phone now, and not have to turn it over until well after the next iPhones expected announce date of September 12. Its a good time to sell your iPhone to one of the eight or so places that will let you; Prices are just going to keep dropping as the big reveal approaches. Whichever reseller you go with, act now. [CNET]

via Gazelle Will Give You Cash For Your iPhone Without Leaving You Phoneless For a Month.

Posted in Apple, Deals, HowTo, Interesting, iOS, tips | Leave a comment

Terms of Service; Didnt Read

Posted on August 20, 2012 by StevenTorresRamos

ToS;DR is a young project started in June 2012. The data is subject to important changes. This is your opportunity to help us fix the “biggest lie on the web”: join us if you have information to contribute related to specific terms or if you have a comment!ToS;DR aims at creating a transparent and peer-reviewed process to rate and analyse Terms of Service and Privacy Policies in order to create a rating from Class A to Class E. We need more legal expertise, please also join the working-group. We also need people to contribute source code. Everything is JavaScript and JSON. The data is freely available CC-BY-SA and ready to be used for other tools, like browser extensions.

via Terms of Service; Didnt Read.

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Steve Jobs Stolen iPad Taken by Party Clown

Posted on August 17, 2012 by StevenTorresRamos

Reread every noun in the headline above—now lets proceed. After a desperate burglar nabbed $60k worth of gear from Steve Jobs former residence, one of his iPads wound up in the mitted hands of Kenny the Clown. Clown.The tablet trickled down to the California entertainer, The Mercury News reports, shortly after the robbery—an apparent gift from an alleged criminal to his clown pal, who used it to play The Pink Panther theme song. Not exactly an efficient use of an expensive gadget owned by perhaps the most famed figure in the history of computing, but hey—a clowns gotta live. But the routine didnt last, as cops retrieved the iPad. Kennys act is now silenced, but hes taking it well: “It would be like getting a football from Joe Montana that was stolen out of his house,” he reflected. And so concludes the time a professional clown used a deceased Steve Jobs iPad to play The Pink Panther theme song as part of a clowning routine. [Mercury News via Inquirer via Verge]

via Steve Jobs Stolen iPad Taken by Party Clown.

Posted in Apple, Breaking News, Humor, Interesting, News | Leave a comment

The Interview Question That is Always Asked and How to Nail It

Posted on August 17, 2012 by StevenTorresRamos

“Do you have any questions for us?” As someone who regularly conducts interviews, I find it staggering how many interviewees are not prepared for the one question that you can be absolutely certain will be asked. In some ways, it is the most important question of the entire interview. The interviewer will look at the questions that you ask as representative of your top priorities.If you just respond with, “No, I have already heard what I need to know,” it makes you seem disinterested and complacent. Even worse, if you ask the wrong questions, you could immediately invalidate the rest of the interview. This is exactly what happened to the interviewee from yesterday. The two questions that he chose to ask us were: “How often are you allowed to work from home?”, and “How long do you think I would have to work on this team before being eligible for promotion?”With these responses, he unknowingly communicated that his top priorities were to avoid coming into the office as much as possible, and that he really wasnt interested in helping our team succeed, but instead wanted to use us as a stepping stone to find something else more interesting. Unfortunately for him, this led to his resume being promptly moved into the Deleted Items box in Outlook.

via The Interview Question That is Always Asked and How to Nail It.

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Scientists Invent Revolutionary Device that Could Help Stop Cancer and Detect Faint Alien Signals Too!

Posted on August 16, 2012 by StevenTorresRamos

Researchers at the National Physical Laboratory and Imperial College London have found a simple way to make masers. According to team leader Dr. Mark Oxborrow, this “new type of electronic device” could revolutionize the world in the same way lasers did—and even beyond that.How revolutionary, you ask? What about detecting a tiny tumor way before it metastasizes? Or powering a radiotelescope that could put us in contact with alien civilizations?

via Scientists Invent Revolutionary Device that Could Help Stop Cancer and Detect Faint Alien Signals Too!.

Posted in Breaking News, Interesting, Science | Leave a comment

LMFAO at NASA Mars Rover Parody [VIDEO]

Posted on August 16, 2012 by StevenTorresRamos

This NASA parody has successfully landed on the Internet, no parachute needed.

“We’re NASA and We Know It” reworks LMFAO’s infectious hit “Sexy and I Know It” with new lyrics adjusted for full-throttle space geekiness.

Roger that, Jet Propulsion Lab, we have viral video liftoff.

via LMFAO at NASA Mars Rover Parody [VIDEO].

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PLY90 Bracket | Uncrate

Posted on August 16, 2012 by StevenTorresRamos

Building things from scratch just got a whole lot easier. The PLY90 Bracket ($45 and up) is a new connector for building projects that lets you connect pieces of material together using nothing but some brackets and an Allen wrench. Desks, tables, shelves – you name it, you can build it. Just don’t mind the gaps.

via PLY90 Bracket | Uncrate.