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Year: 2009

Credit Cards: Fees, Minimum Amounts, and Your Rights

credit-cardsAfter eating lunch at a local restaurant yesterday, I noticed that when I was signing my receipt they had printed my whole credit card number on there. I hadn’t seen that happen in years, and I immediately scratched it out. I happened to be with a group of cyber security guys, and they were all in disbelief as well.

It would be very easy for a thief to pick up your receipt just after you leave, then go home and have an online shopping spree. The server or anyone else handling your receipt could do the same thing.

A Magazine For Everything

I stopped by Asheville Parking Services today to renew my parking pass, and there on the waiting room table were all these magazines about, well, parking. Who woulda thunk?

What Your Internet Plan Will Look Like Without Net Neutrality

If Senator John McCain has way by defeating the FCC’s move to support Net Neutrality with his “Internet Freedom Act“, this is what your Internet plan options could easily look like:

net

Say “goodbye” to experiencing the World Wide Web as you know it, and say “hello” to experiencing it as you do your cable TV, with restrictions on what you get unless you want to pay more, and unless the content providers pay more to be listed there.

As usual, the notion that a “government takeover” and a “marxist plot” are being bantered around to generate support for McCain’s bill through fear and ignorance. It goes without saying that McCain was the biggest beneficiary of  telco/ISP money in 2008, to the tune of $894,379.

Picture courtesy of some quink at Reddit.  Click the pic for the full-size image.

Best Buy Officially Sucks

A lawsuit has been filed against Best Buy for price match fraud. You know how they tout on their commercials that if you find a better deal somewhere else, they will match the price? Well, I guess that doesn’t count their own web site.

The Consumerist reports the details of the lawsuit and how the shenanigans occur:

1. You walk into a Best Buy to purchase a sale item you saw on their site.

2. The employee tells you that the item is no longer on sale, and shows you what looks to be Best Buy’s website, but it’s really a secret intranet that Best Buy’s corporate office denies exists. The price on the website shows that the sale is over.

3. You cry and leave, then at home you see that the sale isn’t over at all. What happened?

I have acquired a growing distaste for Best Buy and will only go there when dire circumstances require it, such as needing a new wireless router at 8PM on a Friday night. (heh)

Now I’ll definitely think about staying away at all costs.