scam of sorts

Hey yo

For some odd reason the internet (or just Blogger) is really slow right now. It's likely the university; this system isn't the most tyre-smokin fast that there ever was. Anyway this means I can't post a funny photo for today. The "upload photos" box won't open.

Regardless, on to the topic of this post... a subtle scam at Bestbuy. There's a promotion on right now, that's been on for a couple of weeks and has another week to go, where they give you a free HP colour printer ($130 value) when you buy a digital camera. I wasn't aware of this deal when I bought my camera yesterday afternoon, however they kindly pointed it out to me. Obviously I was delighted; the only extra expense was the $8.50 Alberta tax on printer cartridges, but I think you get that back if you dispose of them properly. Oh, and of course, printer companies don't provide any connector cables with printers anymore (lazy bastards). Only the power cords. So you have to buy one, and at Bestbuy they only had one type for USB... a normal USB 2.0 compatible cable with GOLD PLATED connectors. It cost $35 plus tax. I know... $43.50 for a $130 printer still isn't a bad deal, but it's still annoying when you weren't planning on getting one in the first place. So I didn't get the connector. Instead I swung by the dollar store today and got one for $2.00.

Okay this story sounds lame and whiny now. In my mind it was way better.

But really... who has ever lost data during a UNB transfer? I never have ("transfer reliability" was their reason for the gold plating). And I've certainly never felt that the superior conductivity of gold plating will help to make my data transfers more reliable. After all it's only a plating... the rest of the conductive material is still the stainless steel and copper and whatever else they use. And the cable is not the limiting factor in the speed of a USB data transfer. It's typically the speed of the device you're connecting to your computer (printer, camera, ipod, etc) that dictates the overall transfer speed.

Okay enough complaining. But if anyone can provide a convincing explanation why we need gold plated USB cables please do so.

Now time to research and write a paper that "may be too thick to fit in the mailbox" of my emeritus supervisor. Oh yeah... and it has to be written by Thursday, so I can present and defend on Friday. Oh and I also have to find two reviewers in addition to my two supervisors.

Fun times begin right now.

Cheers, mates!