They are hoping you will subscribe to their streaming service, but it works just fine without subscribing to theirs. It also aggregates multiple streaming services into a consolidated guide rather nicely.
Not as nice as Channels DVR (which also lets you record streams and will strip commercials), but one of the nicer streaming boxes for the money.
Just plug an external streaming box into it and move on. Embedded apps were always a dumb idea. Double bonus - disconnecting the TV from the 'net will stop their spying on you too.
Just checked and I'm not in it either according to havibeenpwned.com, but was an AT&T customer for over 15 years and only recently stopped being an active customer.
This is the importance of the state in keeping the populace in a perpetual state of fear with their propagandists in the media. It's what allows garbage legislation like this to proceed in the first place.
1Blocker has a built in internal device local VPN service that also covers all apps on the phone - not just Safari. Breaks any of the "free with ad" games so yeah, it's effective!
Have you tried to price out a comparative PC?
If you even can? Because there aren't many that will take as much RAM as that $50K Mac Pro and when you do find a PC that will all of the sudden you realize there isn't much of an Apple tax at all for the equivalent hardware.
Want to argue that Apple should have more variation in their offerings and price points? Sure - I heartily agree. But blithely tossing out a contextless $50K price tag as being some sort of "tax" is just silly.
I think an analogy to supercars is pretty relevant. They are a minuscule percentage of cars developed/sold but have a disproportionate influence on the car market overall.
I'm sure there are analogies for a lot of other industries as well.
Also - there is no cloud, just someone else's computer. Which is why I will never rely on something like a Chromebook, the web or other modern day equivalents of dumb terminals :)
Like a belt of solar panels around the equator? Works for Dyson Sphere Program but that's a game. As big as the US is, for CONUS the entire continent is in the dark for significant portions of the day. It doesn't get more intermittent than that!
> and you have sufficient transmission,
Well duh. And assuming zero transmission loss. Or enough resources to overcome transmission loss and still be economically viable.
Once the subsidies dried up, the snake oil salesmen came out. Timeshare hawkers are evil, but they have NOTHING on rooftop solar companies.
And in Nevada the regs changed and now people aren't getting paid for what they generate at anywhere near the same level which further levels the "value proposition".
Home solar was always propped up and if adoption has dropped off significantly in climates that are prime for it - it has zero chance elsewhere in the country.