2x16: Indeskribable

Yeah, I had one for my 5. I am opposed to cases on principle, though; half the reason I choose a phone is that it’s attractive, and it’s basically impossible to be as attractive if it’s swaddled in a plastic case. bah humbug, etc.

silicone

what evaaar

Still ugly. :slight_smile:

You think? I thought this was quite attractive looking, for a phone case.

image

Yeah, it ain’t for me. I mean, look at a decent phone – the iPhone 5, my OPX, the Xperia X Compact. Black glass; milled metal edging; intricate. Glossy. Chromed. Sharply-turned corners. Not everyone likes this look, admittedly, but I do. Putting a matt black spongy bouncy castle around it ruins it, for me. :frowning:

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It’s not spongy, it’s … nice! And grippy, which I find the naked iPhone 6s to not be at times. Here it is in its case, compared to an SE.

IMG_0030

… an SE which hasn’t been on charge since Tuesday morning …

Those cases with the battery bulge look a little weird to me.

@sil you should definitely check out the Essential phone then as they have all that integral case strength stuff so you can have a phone that can be dropped without a case and still survive. Mind you, curious to see if it would prevent the screen from shattering.

No battery case for the win :wink: :

I think the issue you highlight, which is very true in some companies, is more of an issue with capitalism than rich people. Of course, capitalism makes people rich, but it sounds like the issue you highlight here is more about the balance between making money and decency towards your staff and customers.

There is a misnomer that there is a legal statute to “maximize shareholder value”, but it isn’t the case. This was a mantra that was kicked off by business leaders in the 70s and has become a common term used for companies with shareholders. Part of this misconception is that companies should be expected to maximize profits over the welfare of their staff and customers, which is also not true.

The problem here in my mind is with assholes.

If you run a company where you only care about the bottom line and generating as much revenue as possible, and you don’t care about the welfare of your staff and customers, you are a terrible person. While some people like this clearly exist, I think there is also a growing trend in companies to try to get this balance better. I see more and more companies (not just in the bay area, but more widely) are offering perks designed to make their teams happier and healthier such as free childcare, free haircuts, free drinks/snacks, mental health days, standing/ergonomic desks/chairs, extended maternity/paternity leave, and other things that relate to the welfare of their staff. As they should…people should be able to work in a safe and comfortable environment.

Of course, there will always be a contention in the marketplace between consumers and companies. There will be a pressure from companies to keep you buying their products/services often enough that you provide a steady flow of cash and they provide a steady flow of value to you. This is a balance, and some get it right, some get it wrong.

This is why I balked at the notion that all rich people screw the poor. I would also balk that capitalism is all the same too. There are some wonderful companies who treat their staff and customers well, and some that don’t. This is just life: there are good people and shitty people, there are good companies and shitty companies.

Just my $0.02c.

I’d agree capitalism is the issue here and since this is often the mechanism by which people get rich it should not be too much of a surprise that a lot of rich people have capitalist ideals so tend to be more likely to concentrate on the bottom line.

You cite such things as free childcare, haircuts, snacks etc. Has it crossed your mind that this may not be for altruistic reasons. By providing these services workers are more likely to spend more hours in work and are more productive so makes sense even if are only concentrating on the bottom line.

Do I believe that all rich people are screwing the poor, no but their is a significant section of society that is.

Of course there are lots of rich people using their time and money to help society and people. I won’t list specific examples but I’m sure we all can think of several.

There are a few phones out there meeting the form factor, but yeah, aside from the aforementioned, nothing is “flagship” and most are just crap, although they sometimes “look the part”:

I tried to get along on the $59 unlocked BLU Vivo 5 Mini but found the 512MB RAM is exceptionally limiting, and apparently there are size controls in the Play store that leave out small devices like this. Also the screen is crap, but for $59 I was okay with that… but Android was using > 400MB of RAM, and some is allocated out, so running anything outside of what it shipped with just brought it to a crawl. Too bad so sad, as physically, it’s a perfect clone of the iPhone 5.

Oh totally, but I think we are starting to see a seed change where companies understand that happier staff are more productive staff. So, I would say it is about doing better business, but driven by empathy as opposed to profit margins.

Yeah, I would be curious to know how this all balances out. For every rich asshole, how many good rich people are there. Of course, there is no way of knowing this. :slight_smile:

Re: massive phones.

My wife has a tremor in her left arm and slow coordination in the right and really could do with a sub 5" phone. She got on with a hand-me-down Galaxy s3 mini and iPhone 4 but they were from 2012 and were really starting to lag. The big problem we had was finding a phone she could handle that had more than 1GB RAM as modern app and sites are painful to use with less than 2GB.

We ended up with the Galaxy J3 which is just 5". She is okay with it but she does loose her grip more often now.

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I really really like the idea for this, but I honestly just don’t have faith in the company. You know how Canonical gets a huge reputation for inventing their own stuff all the time? Purism is doing that with fewer people and higher aspirations.

But man, I’m definitely watching ubports to see where they go.

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I think the asshole/nice-CEO ratio is dependent on size of the company, or more specifically number of employees in the company.

Over the past decade I’ve been working for a company with 118,000+ employees. During a relatively recent bankruptcy, our CEO was demanding concessions from all labor groups, while simultaneously raking in $50,000/day compensation. I’m sure the fella is just fine at a dinner party, but in front of labor groups, he’s an asshole; not because he doesn’t care for humans, or is on a mission to make employees’ workdays a living hell, but because he employs that 70’s mantra about maximizing shareholder profits. Why? Because if he doesn’t, The Board will replace him with someone who does.

I believe the skill level of the work force plays a part as well in a CEO’s attitude towards the workforce. Google or Apple execs look at their workforce differently from Wal-Mart, and are thus willing to “give in” on perks such as beanbag chairs and on-demand omelettes at lunch – though I have to say a company like Costco here in the U.S., somewhat similar to Wal-Mart as a retailer, has been able to maintain good workforce relations through decent compensation and other valued factors.

In addition, level of assholiness decreases if the CEO is running a self-made empire (Sir Richard Branson) as opposed to a hired hand. The self-made ones seem to show more caring, understanding and empathy than the ones coming through the 2-year revolving door.

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We really need to have more empathy. $50,000/day just doesn’t go as far as it use to. :smile:

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Really people earn less than this?? Sounds like a minimal hourly rate :yum:

Sarcasm mode fully invoked here!

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I used to work for a firm where the CEO was not the best engineer I have ever met but self motivated and a true entrepreneur. He understood I was a better engineer than him, though he was arguably a better programmer and certainly a better businessman. I had a company business credit card which my immediate boss was not aware of because while my immediate boss wanted to manage everything the CEO realised that as senior engineer things ran better if I treated the engineering staff to a beer most Fridays and a feed every few months. Our senior software engineer was similarly placed and none of the staff who worked for us ever knew we were spending company money. The expenses were always approved directly by the CEO.

I think most of our guys thought David and myself were paid more than we were because how else could we take all the department out every week.This may have been a deliberate ploy to make junior staff feel they could earn a lot more if they did well and so was was an incentive to them.

This. 100%

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