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On an slightly unrelated note, I was reading this article on the verge app but had to switch to the mobile website because the video would only open at face cringe resolution on the former.

Is it the same thing with iOS or is this an Android-only thing?

about 12 hours ago on Valve announces 'Robotic Boogaloo,' the first 'Team Fortress 2' update built by the community

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You’re two hundred percent right. Offline availability is definitely a must.

And let’s remember the US is just a part (albeit a significant one) of the PC/mobile market. Pretty much everywhere else on the planet (exception made to the more developed European countries) internet access is way more restricted. I agree that building things only for the least common denominator is not they way to go for anyone, but leaving them entirely out of what you create should only be the solution when innovation can’t cater to their needs. This is definitely not the case.

about 20 hours ago on Where Google needs to go from here, after I/O 2 recommends

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I live in Brazil too, and even though I’m not big on iPhone myself (my platform of choice would be Windows Phone), if I were a developer I would target iOS as well.

Fragmentation is key here. With one app I could serve the entire iOS user base in one fell swoop, while Android would require multiple apps to support multiple resolutions, form factors and hardware specifications if I were to provide the same level of experience.

Also, the iOS marketshare in Brazil is anything but tiny. I see them basically everywhere I go, specially since the iPhone 4 and 3GS became way cheaper on contract after the iPhone 5 came out.

One thing that would be interesting to know is if those sales numbers are purely POS data or if they actually track activations. I’m pretty sure that there are millions of iPhones in use in Brazil that were bought in the US because there is a tax exemption for bringing one phone back when you travel abroad. Considering an iPhone 5 costs upwards of 700 dollars On CONTRACT in Brazil, those numbers are probably not insignificant.

4 days ago on Windows Phone overtakes BlackBerry to claim third place in 2013 smartphone shipments 3 replies 1 recommend

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I live in Brazil, and I agree that carriers (not just in the US) just get away with stuff like they own the president or something. I would say our carrier situation is a little better (our contracts are restricted to one year, unlocking is not just allowed but mandatory and we have even applied severe penalties, like forbidding carriers to sell new activations for two months, which seems to be unthinkable in the US today), but in other areas, like cars for instance, we get majorly screwed.

Case in point for comparison sake: we only sell the most expensive Camaro here, and it costs (no joke) a hundred thousand dollars. A ford fiesta can go as high as 25K. The profit margins the manufacturers make in Brazil are ludicrous, and largely responsible for covering the slim to nonexistent profits they were making elsewhere during the crisis.

The stuff really large business and the stock market get away with seems to be the single reason why capitalism is backfiring almost as badly as socialism, IMHO.

Please note the “almost” as a key word in that sentence. Not trying to bring about any sort of flame wars, but man do we get short end of the stick sometimes.

4 days ago on Google Hangout video chats don't work on AT&T cellular connections on Android, but why? 1 reply 1 recommend

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That’s because you used Axe for years :P

12 days ago on Lumia 928's PureView camera competes with Galaxy S III and iPhone 5 in Nokia video

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Coverage just started in Brazil as well. And yes, the same complete lack of information on WP is endemic here too…

I showed my non-working 4G signal to the Lumia guy from the store (this one actually had one) and all he did was switch my mobile network to Edge only and then back to 4G. When it didn’t work, he was like “that’s what I’ve been told to do”, and handed back my phone.

USD 101 is quite expensive for a small country like NZ. I pay USD 140 for 5GB of LTE, unlimited talk to the same carrier, 400 minutes for other carriers and landlines and unlimited text. Also, we don’t pay for tethering =)

13 days ago on My Lumia 920 saga

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Look, I’m Brazilian and I won’t defend our police. It’s done way worse than it had to do, in way too many occasions.

But the way you phrased this makes me feel like Brazilian police brutality is the most common form of police brutality, which I don’t think anyone can actually prove to be true.

Unless you can quote actual statistic on this, unless you have real data to back up your assumptions, I ask that you please refrain from making that kind of criticism. You could find a police brutality report from Brazil every day of the year and it would still be irrelevant in terms of statistical prevalence.

13 days ago on Helicopter video reveals GTA-style law enforcement in Brazilian slums 3 recommends

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Thanks, man.

Wow, you guys get the short end of the stick too, I see.

That’s unsubsidized right? How much would you pay per month for a 5GB LTE plan and a reasonable number of minutes in New Zealand?

13 days ago on My Lumia 920 saga 1 reply

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Yeah, because there are just as many people using RSS as there are on Twitter.

And if only they could do both.

14 days ago on UN Twitter account follows 537 people, including one porn star 1 reply

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Oh come on, dude, seriously.

Can you think of a cheaper way of reaching 1.5 million people at once? A lot of the work the UN does has to do with raising awareness of the issues it faces, and yes, part of “your taxpayer money” will fund that.

Twitter is only a “commercial” service in the sense Twitter makes money out of it, not in the sense that the UN profits from or pay to use it. It’s actually a great platform for the UN to send out its message for next to nothing compared to the costs of advertising on TV, for instance.

14 days ago on UN Twitter account follows 537 people, including one porn star 1 reply 1 recommend

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David makes the best faces. I took a random picture of the monitor and this came out:

14 days ago on Top Shelf 009: a few of our favorite things

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Me too. But I find that even the desktop mode in windows 8 better than in 7 because of speed. I did one fresh installation of each on the same PC on the same day, and there is an obvious boost in performance that I have come to miss in windows 7.

24 days ago on Six months on, Windows 8 sales are a mystery 5 recommends