The Dodge Retort

The bureaucracy and rules behind the Massachusetts FAST LANE could well be termed the HACK LANE. That’s because it punishes good customers (me!) and then makes them jump through hoops to get the fines reversed.

Granted, the FAST LANE is a huge convenience. I whiz through the Hampton, N.H. tolls at 60 miles per hour (yes, the Live Free of Die state charges two dollars for use of about a dozen miles of  I-95). It beats the numb glare of the toll taker, but this is also an altogether too easy way for taxing authorities to take money our of your pocket.

Here’s my beef: I neglected to update the expiration date of my credit card so I went over my balance. FAST LANE outrageously charges a fine of $50 every time you go through a toll and have no credit balance.

That’s because rather than giving you the option to charge your credit card for every toll, FAST LANE takes $45 and then draws down the tolls. So my wife goes through the Hampton tolls today and the orange light goes and says “call service center.”

We had no balance left and FAST LANE could not charge my card $45 to refresh my credit balance. By the way, take those orange lights seriously and don’t wait to call the service or check your account online.

I thought I had updated the credit card expiration date earlier this week before we went over our credit balance. It didn’t take, apparently, because I did not re-enter the card number, too.

I did it correctly this morning about 10 minutes after my wife went through the toll that zapped our credit balance. The service center rep said we will probably get fined, but it did not show up on her computer because there’s a two day lag time for the recording of violations.

She added that I will probably get a letter about the fine and an appeal form to possibly overturn it. The process, she said, takes 30 to 60 or 90 days to process. When pressed, she said I would probably be forgiven, but will be charged $5 for processing.

I’m thinking this is a lousy way to treat a good and regular customer. If Amazon or even Verizon treated customers this way, they would not survive. It’s the heavy-handedness and arrogant behavior of bureaucrats who seem to report to no one. Maybe, I should give back back my transponders and get back in the lines.

While I was online, I checked my annual FAST LANE balance – it’s quadrupled in the past four years mostly from toll increase. The former Mass. Turnpike Authority, which was folded in the Mass. DOT last year, was a cesspool of patronage and mismanagement. It was always broke, too.

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Darth Vader is not happy about his iPhone 4….

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I love this…..iPhone mania is lunacy…a bit off color but unambiguous

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I knew there was another reason I liked Droid Incredible better Droid X Android-based smartphone. The “flicker and banding” problems with Droid X displays story broke yesterday after several reports on Web tech talk sites such as Howard Forums.

The review unit of the Droid X I returned this morning to Verizon Wireless’ PR agency had no such problem. Engadget reported Tuesday that Motorola and Verizon Wireless made the following statement to its inquiry about the display issue.

“Verizon Wireless and Motorola are aware of a very small number of DROID X units that have experienced a flickering or banding display. Motorola has resolved the issue and is continuing to ship the phones. Any consumer who experiences a flickering or banding display should contact a Motorola customer support center or Verizon Wireless.”

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This one gives me goosebumps….nice video, Flightblogger….

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What difference does an ounce make? When it comes to smartphones, a lot.

The Droid X made by Motorola and sold by Verizon Wireless is lot of smart phone for 200 bucks:  its big 4.3 inch display is brilliant and crisp. The X’s thin design is sleek and a major improvement upon the brick-like profile of its original Motorola Droid. Verizon Wireless loaned me a review unit late last week and I’ve been putting it through its paces.

Droid X

But I give the Droid Incredible (which TDR followers know I loved)  from HTC with its smaller 3.7 inch screen and profile a small edge.  Given, they are both $200 Verizon smartphones with the usual two year service contract, they beg comparison.

Here’s the weigh-in: The X weighs 5.47 ounces (49 ounces less than original Motorola Droid) versus 4.59 ounces for the Incredible (versus 3.7 ounces for my aging Blackberry Curve). Watching videos on the X, my hand tired holding it up while I was horizontal on the couch.

It feels a bit bulky in my pants pocket, too. It’s 5.02 inches tall, .039 inches at it thickest point and 2.57 inches wide versus. The Incredible is a touch thicker, a touch less wide and 4.63 inches tall.

Both are both based on the Android version 2.1 operating system, but that’s where the innards’ similarities end. The X comes with a different chipset known as OMAP from Texas Instruments,  long a mainstay in cell phones. And it has the Motorola application platform, whatever that is.

The Incredible phone is based on Qualcomm’s Snapdragon processor and is a heavily Google-ized phone. Verizon Wireless  calls the Incredible a “Google Experience Device (GED).” The X is a pure Android…the differences are subtle, but simply put, the GED is an Android-based phone with lots of Google apps built in.

So what does all this mean? I found some of X’s applications a bit funky and hard to use. For example, it was easy uploading photos from the Incredible to Facebook. It took some messing around to set it up on the X. The X’s camera had a pronounced shutter delay (maybe it was the lighting, but it never seemed fast in the 50 shots I took mostly in broad daylight) and it initially took me a few minutes to figure out that the shutter button was on the side.

Verizon's Incredible from HTC

Speaking of buttons, the X does a lot more with physical controls on the phone itself. I was constantly using the go back button, which the third from the right in the photo. I prefer the Incredible’s heavier use of screen-resident controls. The Incredible also seemed a touch faster than the X.

My X’s camera also inexplicably defaulted to black and white shots and I still figuring out how to get color shots back. Mind you, they both have great video cams and 8 mega-pixel cameras. I just had better Kodak moments with the Incredible in the few days Verizon Wireless gave me a loaner.

I also took an instant liking to the Incredible, but had to warm up the X although it is great for watching videos and has excellent apps for texting, e-mail, speech recognition and a great voice phone (as in talk on the phone).

The X is DLNA (Digital Living Network Alliance) certified meaning it can wirelessly or wired share content with other DLNA devices of which I have none and I suspect there are few. So I could not test this app.

I noticed little differences between the Incredible and the X. The on-screen keyboard on the X is excellent, but the CAPS lock stayed on after a keystroke instead of automatically defaulting to lower case which was the Incredible did – a tiny but smart feature.

One edge for the X is that it comes with 16 GB of memory built in and can be upgraded 32 GB whereas the Incredible comes with eight and can only add another 16 GB via a MicroSD card, according to Verizon’s specs (a friend who works for Verizon tells me the Incredible does go up to 32 GB and that Verizon’s specs are wrong).

Grant you, both phones are good and reason enough to say screw Apple’s iPhone should Verizon Wireless ever carry it. I am not saying this just because Steve jobs last week arrogantly excused the antenna problems with the iPhone 4. The Droids are nearly as good as the iPhone and you get a more reliable network with Verizon Wireless than what iPhone users endure with AT&T.

One iPhone advantage I noticed is that many Android apps cannot be sized spreading/pinching thumb and fore finger on the touch sensitive displays. And the single Android New York Times app is pretty basic compared to the several NYT apps for the iPod touch and iPad. After all, the iPhone, introduced Jan. 9, 2007, enjoys a near three-year head start on Android smartphones.

I could spend months testing out the both phones and still find new things. I always get paranoid that when I say a phone lacks a particular feature because maybe I could not find it or turn it on. But that is the phone’s fault, isn’t it?

I haven’t made up my mind for sure given I am waiting until November when I get my discounted phone plus a another $50 off. By that time, the Incredible and X could be in the rear view mirror, supplanted by a raft of new Android smartphones. Verizon Wireless has five, now (six technically, but one is being phased out).

For those with either  the X or the Incredible, what do you think?

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The Boeing 787 Dreamliner steals the show at Farnborough International Air Show. This video offers glimpses of the 787′s interior and is narrated by Randy Tinseth, VP of marketing for Boeing Commercial Airplanes. His full comments oddly headlined “Opportunities” can be found at his blog, Randy’s Journal.

Most notably, Boeing announced $13 billion in orders at Farnborough, but none were for 787s. [updated: the 787 drought ended this morning at Farnborough when Royal Jordanian Airlines ordered three 787s. Thanks to Flightblogger Jon Ostrower for the update.]

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And you didn’t think you could understand Chinese…..

After closely following Toyota’s unintended acceleration problems for SmartPlanet.com in late 2009 and for the first three months of 2010, the joint government-Toyota tests saying drivers were to blame for accidents caused by allegedly stuck accelerators far from exonerates Toyota.

Which got pressed? credit: leeloveshottrends.com

The Wall Street Journal reported Tuesday that black boxes known as “event data recorders” from vehicles showed that the brakes were not applied at impact while the throttles were wide open. I have no problem with the information assuming it can be verified. There’s a lot bad drivers out there who mistake the accelerator for the brake (when depressed, they react sorta differently, don’t they?).

Here’s my questions if driver error turns out to be the leading cause of the accidents:

1) Why did a rash of this happen with Toyotas and not other car brands?

2) Has Toyota done an exceptionally poor job in the engineering of the juxtaposition of brake pedals and accelerators? Are they too close together or similar in feel that one could be mistaken for the other?

3) What is the reliability of event data recorders?

4) How important is data at impact relative to the circumstances leading up to the crash?

5) Can that many drivers be at fault in what are believed to be thousands in unintended acceleration incidents?

6) Why was Toyota not as forthcoming about the magnitude of the problem early on?

7) And if these latest findings are true and are the driver error is leading cause of the crashes, has Toyota been unfairly maligned?

Or did the accelerators just get stuck as predominantly alleged? The path to the truth has many twists and turns and these latest findings are one more example of that. It’ll be years before this mystery is solved.

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Well, I’ve had the iPad for a month and I am supposed to love it. Guess what? I don’t know quite what to do with it.

It seems like a toy….great for watching videos, perusing photos and perhaps reading a book. It’s very good for reading newspapers to which I am addicted, but not hugely better than my $290 PC laptop. It competently plays music, but no better than my much smaller and cheaper iPod Touch.

I surf the App Store about every night to find that killer which will tip me from “I like it” to “I love it.” Everybody else seems to.

The iPad technology is sound, elegant and reliable save its annoying habit of dropping my Wifi connection mid-session. My $290 PC laptop doesn’t ever drop as Wifi session.

I just checked Apple’s stock and it’s trading at $257 a share just $22 off its 52-week high. The market must love the iPad so why don’t I. I want to given that I waited a month for the privilege of shelling out $829 for it, but I am just not there yet.

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Update Sunday night, July 11, 10:12 P.M.

The Wifi dropping problem is apparently not unique to me. There are discussion threads in the Apple forum that examine the problem and Apple has a page with about four work-arounds, including adjusting screen brightness off the lowest settings (???), replacing WEP security with WPA or WPA2 security, making sure your router firmware is up to date or renewing the iPad’s IP address.

I’ll try numbers 1 and 4 given they are easiest. If all of them fail, call Apple.

As for loving my iPad, things are looking up. MTV just released a Beavis and Butthead video clip app for a buck ninety nine for the iPad, iPhone and iPod touch. Actually, I’m not sure this is THE killer iPad app.