Dogs to Run Free in Cupertino

The City of Cupertino is spending hard earned dollars in an idiotic and expensive survey that involves dogs. Don't get me wrong, I like dogs and they in turn appreciate me. I get along with any dog and love playing with them. But what the city is doing is basically absconding their responsibilities to the community and to the tax paying public.

The proposal on the table is to open up selected parks where dogs will be allowed to run at will and without a leash! This is not in a fenced in area, but the whole park. Don't believe me? Check out the official Cupertino City web site: http://www.cupertino.org/dog. This is for dogs off-leash. The city is also spending an unknown amount of money in a survey asking the residents their opinion.

This is one of the stupidest ideas that have even been mooted. Can you imagine the havoc this will cause? Consider the following:

* The parks will be full of POOP. If the dogs run wild in the park will the dog owners run after them to collect the dog poop? The parks are going to the dogs!

* Dogs are pack animals. When they meet a fellow dog, there is the usual banter between them. The battle of wits for top-dog is on. When this gets emotional, watchout. You will not longer be a spectator, instead you will be forced to join in. I've seen dog owners in front of my home, unable to control their dog and being dragged around. How is this going to work when a dog is off-leash and has the entire park to run in?

* Children's health hazard. Most of the parks have children's play areas with slides and swings. Dogs tend to mark their territory by peeing at the poles. Is this what you want in the parks? Who will clean the play area?

* People safety. We tend to use the parks for picnics and leave food around on blankets when we play. The parks are beautiful and well kept and can be used as picnic areas. Will be food be safe when dogs are off-leash? Who will control them?

* The liability issue. When kids run around, dogs tend to chase them. If this happens and when a kid gets injured, who is liable? is the city willing to take on this liability?

The Cupertino council is nuts to take this on. They just establish a 'fenced in' dog park and be done with it. Instead they are spending public money on a survey over an idiotic and unworkable proposition.

What Phone should I ger?

I am looking at upgrading my mobile phone to a smart phone. So which phone should I get? I've been looking at the choices available and have the following comments. Here are my requirements:

* A phone that would work well within the US, especially within the area where I live and work.

* A phone that will also work overseas -- UK, India, and Western Europe.

Given these, I started looking at coverage:

T-Mobile: They have the best customer service there is. Unfortunately their coverage within the US is skimpy. It will take them a few years to get to where AT&T and Verizon are today. The phones themselves are GSM and work well in the UK, France, and India.

Sprint: Good coverage within the US, but once you leave the US, you are pretty much dependent on their so called "alliances". Their customer service leaves a lot to be desired. Really not my preferred carrier.

Verizon: Very good coverage within the US. In fact they have the best coverage within the US. I don't know much about their international coverage and aim to check it out. Customer Service is non-existant in the Verizon World -- their service reps are haughty, and on occasion when I've dealt with them are not even aware of the facts! But persistance paid off and once documentation was presented, they switfly corrected their mistakes.

AT&T: They are famous for having more bars in places that you don't visit, like the great wall of China. They lie in their coverage maps and their phones do not work in places where I travel and live the most! Their reps are absolutely loco and have no idea of what reality is! They do have the iphone but more on that latter.

Now we come to the phones:

iPhone: I am impressed by the iPhone. Several of my friends and collegues have them and some of them are happy with the service. But 2 indicents in the last 2 weeks has thrown me off the iPhone:

- Google Voice is something I use today and plan to use in the future. Apple and AT&T are refusing to cover this, so this is a definite no for me.

- I carry a book reader as well as my phone. In the future I want to use the phone as a book reader. Apple is planning to discontinue support for the iPhone book-reader. Don't they know that there are more than 100,000 books in the public domain available for easy download and conversion to book-reader format?

These 2 applications are a must for me. Without them, I am afraid that the iPhone is ruled out. A 3rd factor affecting this is service with AT&T -- more bars in palces you don't visit or work than where you live and work!

Google Phone: Looks pretty good. Currently offered only with T-Mobile. I hope the situation changes quickly. This is something that is very attractive for me.

Nokia Phones: I am looking at the Nokia N-97. This is currently only available on the GSM networks of T-Mobile and AT&T. Nokia has consistantly brought out good phones. I currently use the Nokia N810 as a book reader and email reader. I like the little machine. There are recent rumors about a the Nokia N900 -- a worthwhile successor to the N810 and a phone included. Is this the future?

Windows Mobile: Lots of phones, lots of carriers, lots of software available for this OS. Looks like the way to go.

I know what I don't want -- I don't want AT&T and I don't want an iPhone. But the choice for what I want is huge and am going to take my time to study the phone and the market before I decide. Notice I've not considered the Palm Pre. That is because it is currently offered only by Sprint and their phones do not work in the UK and India. So without this coverage, Sprint is also out of the running. My carrier choices are between T-Mobile and Verizon.

More in the coming months as I make my choice.

Crapware from HP

Over the last couple of years I've purchased 3 laptops from HP for me and my family. I love the laptops. They are/were state of the smart at the time I purchased them. The only drawback is that I feel cheated. The laptops came with 100+GB disk drives. But HP believes in formatting and loading the disk with all kinds of crapware that consume 25+GB of the disks. Most of these programs are useless program that I'll never use. The ones I use, like the Microsoft programs, I have licenses for and do not want their trialware software. I have licenses for the Anti-Virus software and do not appreciate HP loading Symantec and forcing it on me.  So the first thing I had to do was delete all the crapware.  This does not always work!

Have you tried deleting their crapware and shitware from your brand new PC? If you did, you know what I am talking about. It literally takes hours to get rid of them and then you have to get into the Windows registry to delete unwanted entries. This is not recommended for the faint of heart.  

I've tried to send HP and complain. In my last order I specifically told them I want a bare-bones PC with nothing loaded on it -- they still sent me the crapware. It costs time and money to reformat the drive and get started from scratch.  If you have similar comments send an email to Mark Hurd, the CEO of HP and complain!