Amazon Prime - Student

Last fall I started grad school. My employer reimburses a nice chunk of it, so I figured now is the time to get my MBA. It keeps me pretty busy. About the same time, I signed up for the free trial of Amazon Prime for Students. It does not include the video streaming, but I don't have time for that anyway.

Well now it's time to renew. I had dropped Netflix because I didn't want the distraction, but now when I renew with Amazon I will have to pay for it, and it appears to include the video streaming. I guess I will just have to find some time. Hopefully they have Doctor Who, since that was my favorite Netflix series and I only made it into season 2.

$40 per year does seem like a pretty awesome deal. So if you have an email address with .edu at the end, you could get yourself a great deal on Amazon Prime membership.

Being forced

Last night my MBA cohort started a new class. For some reason the professor brought up Windows 8 and he said that he liked it. He asked the class if anyone was using it, and one (of 27) people are using it. He asked her if she likes it, and she said that she does, but she had to get used to it.
That made me think of an initial complaint I had about my Nexus 5. It appeared to only have two home screens. On the Nexus 4 there were five home screens. But after complaining I realized that most of the shortcuts were just things I used occasionally and the additional home screens were really just additional clutter. So I adapted to using the apps menu for most of the apps, and only put shortcuts on the homes screen for things I used frequently. Now at least everything I use occasionally is in alphabetical order. My calendar widget, as well as shortcuts for Facebook, Gmail, Gas Buddy, and other apps I use regularly are still on the main home screen.
Well after installing some new apps, I learned the Nexus 5 will add more home screens as needed. So it turns out I could have recreated what I had on the Nexus 4, but now I am accustomed to the less-cluttered way and I actually prefer it.
So maybe someday I will even buy a computer with Windows 8.
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Oh, I had to stop myself from laughing. I'm not going to be buying a computer with Windows 8 anytime soon.

Moral debate

I have not had much to post about lately. Life is good. My Nexus 5 is a great phone and has more power than I need. My Nexus 7 (2012) is getting slower but I just have to remember to close the apps that I'm not using and then it works just fine. The one thing I miss is being able to tether on my Nexus 4 without paying for it. There is a new bit of code in the Nexus 5 that tells it to report to the carrier whenever a user tries to tether. So now it can't be done on the sly without paying for tethering. I found a solution online where you add a line to the registry that effectively cancels that reporting command. You have to root your phone to do that, which I've never done before, but it doesn't seem too difficult.
The reason I have not done so is for moral reasons. I was one of those kids who used Napster to download a bunch of songs for free. And at one point I used BitTorrent and other P2P programs to download all kinds of crazy stuff. But then it dawned on me that it was theft. I know some people get a thrill out of seeing how many movies they can pirate, and what else they can get away with, but to me that seems like shoplifting, and I'm getting too old for that crap. I'm a grownup with a job and I can afford to pay for tethering if I truly need it.
For now I am going to keep using a Blu-ray ripper to rip my existing DVD and Blu-ray movies to digital formats that I can load onto my tablet. If I want to watch Netflix then I will just use my phone like I did in the old days (two years ago).
I'm not writing this to preach to anyone. It's just something that's been on my mind lately.

Nexus 8 rumors

There are some rumors floating around about a Nexus 8 being released in a couple of months. If it is real, this is what I would like to see in the new tablet:

The same processors (CPU and GPU) as used in my Nexus 5.

4 GB of RAM.

At least 64 GB of storage. 32 has been plenty for me on my N7, but bigger is better!

8 inch screen

Outside dimensions no larger than the Nexus 7 tablets. Even if it's the same as the original 2012 version. They should be able to reduce the size of the bezel and put an 8 inch screen in the same size tablet.

I also want them to keep the pricing comparable to what the N7 pricing has been. I didn't buy the 2013 N7 because my old one was sufficient. So I want to see some huge jumps in specs and a good price to make it worth my while to upgrade. 

This is my wishlist. Any thoughts?