Sometimes, the people who you think are good friends, turn out to be the ones who are not worth your friendship.
And the people who you think are not worth your friendship, turn out to be great friends.
That, or I’m bad at judging people.
The rising prices of Apple products
I fell in love with the iPhone ever since I touched one that belonged to a friend. Back then, the iPhone was exclusive only to a certain carrier and I was on a different one.
Years later, that carrier no longer had the exclusivity and I was able to buy the 3GS model. My very first smartphone. Even queued through the night for it.
Since then, I would upgrade my iPhone almost every time when there was a new release. As of this time, I’m using an iPhone 8 Plus 256GB which costs SGD $1,030, after recontracting with my carrier for 2 years. My monthly phone bill is about $40.
With the recent announcement of the new iPhone models, an XS Max 256GB will cost $1,475 and the XS 256GB at $1,335. (2 year re-contract)
While it’s a more powerful phone than the previous generation, at the way the new phones are being priced, I have no doubt it will gradually become unaffordable to the average person.
Guess this 8 Plus will have to stick with me for one or more years.
On the bright side, there’s no “compelling” feature on the Xs that make me want to own one.
My iPad Mini 4 serves me very well since I only use it to read manga.
The only Apple product I want to upgrade is my MacBook Pro. It’s an early 2015 model with 16GB of ram, 128GB SSD.
I’m having disk space issues as I only have 5GB free most of the time. I run virtual machines so I need lots of ram. Responsiveness seems to have been a thing of the past because a lot of my work apps are CPU intensive.
I was glad when they announced 32GB ram MacBook Pros but disappointed to learn it was only for the 15″ model. I would prefer to stick with the 13″ model for it’s lighter weight.
If I ever get the MacBook Pro with the specs that I want, I don’t see myself upgrading my Apple products for years to come.
Unless….
Apple comes up with something so compelling I just have to get my hands on…
Which I doubt they will for at least the next 3 years.
Duplicate Questions
I use search engines a lot for work, for satisfying my curiosity, for finding the answer to the meaning of life (turns out it is 42).
The first thing I always check is the date of the result.
Why?
Because the answers to my questions may change over time.
The answer at that time may only apply to a software version that existed only at that time. A newer software version today may have a different answer.
Or maybe someone else has found a better way to solve the question using technology available today that didn’t exist back then when the question was asked.
So why blog about this?
Because often, among the answers, there is often that one guy that replies “This is a duplicate question” or “This has already been answered” and then points to a similar question or answer that is many years old.
Not forgetting the once amusing but now annoying lmgtfy.com,
I understand the frustration of having to see the same questions pop up over and over again. I don’t have a solution for it. My only advice is to have more patience or just ignore it if you can’t deal with it.
But sometimes, the same question has to be asked again because answers may change as time passes. (Of course not ask everyday but once in a few months?)
Avoid pop.co
A while ago, I bought the tickets for Laracon Online. Among the goodies you get is a free .co domain for a year with a domain registrar called pop.co.
There was a special promo link that you have to use to get your free domain, but this link wasn’t communicated clearly enough and I paid for my .co domain.
So I tried to contact them to see if this could be rectified. I didn’t expect a refund, but maybe just extend my domain with an extra year.
No response. Nothing at all from them, for weeks.
Today, I tried to login to webmail on pop.co. Logged in successfully but I keep getting redirected back to the login screen.
And if you check their twitter account, you’ll see that there are no more responses after the goodies where given out when Laracon Online went live.
Something’s fishy.
Transferring out my domain to my current registrar (This is not a sponsored post, lol). WHOIS lookup prishe.com if you want to know who.
This one I’m using now has been reliable, and support promptly responds to my questions.
In summary, fuck pop.co
On Cryptocurrencies
When bitcoin was first announced, it boasted of features that would help make “ideas flourish”.
With low transaction fees, no chargebacks, it was supposed to help businesses in their transactions.
But today, it has achieved none of that, or maybe it does in the black markets, but I’m not familiar with that.
And while no significant life-improving thing has been achieved, a lot of processing power, resources to make chips for those processing power and electricity to power those chips are continually being consumed in enormous amounts by cryptocurrency miners.
I feel that all these resources could’ve been spent on more important things.
Like protein folding.
Making cheaper computers for people who can’t afford one.
Electricity to power more cars so that fossil fuels can be phased out faster.
In my eyes, cryptocurrencies are nothing but just a new age ponzi scheme.
People treat them as an investment in the future.
A vaporware future.
Having said all that, I still bought about $800 worth of coins last year just to learn what the process is like to purchase coins.
Sold them when their price went up, bought them again when their price fell. Now I have $1200 worth of coins, just waiting for the next price increase.
Blockchain technology on the other hand, may bring improvements to various industries. And as long as it doesn’t consume so much resources, it’s something I can agree with.