Archive for the ‘could_do_better’ Category
I’ve seen a ton of bad news stories about PayPal over the last few years – here are just the top three from my payments tag on pinboard.in. I’ve even run afoul of their over sensitive fraud detection myself in the last couple of months (whilst trying to buy Club Penguin subscriptions for my kids whilst […]
Filed under: could_do_better, grumble | 2 Comments
Tags: fail, fraud, geolocation, google, LTE, Nexus 7, payments, paypal, Play, resolution, store
Indistinguishable from fraud
I came across this tweet yesterday: It was timely, as I was in the midst of sorting out a foreign exchange transaction that had gone wrong. I’d sent $250 to a recipient in the US, and only $230 had shown up in their account (and then their bank had charged them $12 for the privilege […]
Filed under: could_do_better, grumble | 3 Comments
Tags: banking, charges, fees, financial services, fraud, FX, international, payments, spreads
Magic teabags
I’m a creature of habit, and like a cup of green and Earl Grey[1] to start my day and a Red Bush (aka Rooibos) mid afternoon. Approximately nowhere that I go has the tea that I like to drink, so I take along my own stash. This means that I often find myself asking for a […]
Filed under: could_do_better, grumble | 3 Comments
Tags: EasyJet, heath and safety, hot water, magic, tea, tea bag, teabag
Presenting with a Chromebook
I decided to use my Samsung ARM Chromebook for a presentation at Brighton Pi last night. It did not go well. Creating the presentation Using Google Docs instead of Powerpoint was pretty straightforward. I never do much fancy with my slides – usually just a visual anchor or a few bullet points, so no real […]
Filed under: could_do_better, grumble, Raspberry Pi, technology | 1 Comment
Tags: beamer, Chromebook, crash, dual, freeze, google, Google Docs, hang, HDMI, lock up, offline, presenting, projector, screen, share, unstable
End of support, end of the line
I’ve written before about the myth of software support. Software mostly doesn’t work, vendors mostly don’t fix stuff, and the world keeps turning anyway. Everything’s broken and nobody’s upset. So why do companies stop using perfectly good stuff (hardware and software) simply because they can’t buy support from the original vendor? This position seems nonsensical […]
Filed under: could_do_better, technology, travel | 2 Comments
Tags: end of life, IRIS, Pano Logic, support
I’ve been without a laptop for a few weeks[1], and whilst tablets are fine for consumption and the occasional comment I’ve missed having a keyboard for proper creative work. I’ve been tempted by Lenovo’s Black Friday sale for the X230[2], various Ultrabooks and Netbooks[3], but by the time I’d got an SSD[4] I’d be looking at £400-£500. […]
Filed under: could_do_better, review, technology | 2 Comments
Tags: apps, ARM, Chromebook, google, RDP, Samsung, SSH, VNC
One of the great disappointments for me in last week’s launch of the iPhone 5 is that it doesn’t come with near field communications (NFC) capabilities. This was explained in an interview with Senior VP Phil Schiller: It’s not clear that NFC is the solution to any current problem, Schiller said. “Passbook does the kinds of […]
Filed under: could_do_better, technology | 1 Comment
Tags: apple, authentication, NFC, payments, terminal, token
The 90 day free trial of Azure that I started so that I could describe how to build OpenELEC in the cloud is coming to a close. As I sit here once again waiting for my machine to reboot I don’t think I’ll miss it much when it’s gone. I’ve already written about my issues […]
Filed under: cloud, could_do_better | 8 Comments
Tags: Azure, cloud, iaas, Microsoft, read only, reboot, slow, stability, Ubuntu, unstable, update, upgrade, uptime, VM, VPS
I fly to Zurich a few times a year, and often fly with Swiss, so I’ve been a member of their Miles & More rewards programme (which is run by Lufthansa) for some time. To help keep hold of my miles (and even top them up a little) I got the connected credit card from […]
Filed under: could_do_better, grumble, travel | 3 Comments
Tags: expired, expiry, Lufthansa, MBNA, mileage, Miles and More, rewards, Swiss
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