payeco

mcdave said:

TestFlight needs a chargeable approval system. No point in developing something which can never be published.

You have to be invited to a TestFlight beta and that invite can be revoked. A dev could easily take payment via PayPal for one time payments or set up a Patreon for recurring “subscriptions” and revoke your TestFlight invite if you stop paying. 

cy_starkman said:

at this point the majors must all be plotting on how to consolidate the market by consuming the small fry.

take bets on who will be the big three?

disney, fox, and ?

will sony make a play, can netflix stay indi, do apple and amazon live on as customer loyalty bonuses?

Can Netflix stay independent? Netflix’s market cap is double that of Sony, 10x that of Fox, and almost as much as Disney. With the premium that would be required for an acquisition the price would likely be more than Disney’s market cap. No one is buying Netflix.

chadbag said:

How is it supposed to work?  Is there a place to set/place your phone or does it just scan NFC in the area?   

Sounds like NYC metro authorities need to go to Japan to see how to do it right.  Never had an issue there using my phone or watch. 

Because in Japan the Suica readers are on top of the entry gate and flat. The OMNY readers are mounted to the front of the gate and tilted towards the person entering.

The MTA was trying to do this safely by rolling out OMNY slowly over the course of 18 months. This means turnstiles need to be able to read both MetroCards and NFC methods until the MetroCard is phased out completely. Because MetroCard funds are linked to a card and not an account there was no way to introduce a hybrid card that could be used both ways until the OMNY rollout is complete. That lead the MTA to have to retrofit existing turnstiles to read both payment methods.

sflocal said:

This is an interesting dilemma.  If a person is carrying both NFC methods when walking through the gate, sounds like it's more a mistake of the rider than a technological issue.

I suppose the system could check if more than one payment has been made on the same gate within milliseconds of each other, then it should only charge one method?

MetroCards aren’t NFC based. They use a magnetic strip. The NFC based OMNY cards have not rolled out yet. The only NFC based payment method right now is with a mobile wallet or a contactless credit/debit card.

What’s probably happening is people are swiping their MetroCard to pay but the NFC reader is picking up their phone in their pocket or purse. My guess this is because the MTA went the easiest route possible to retrofit the existing turnstiles which put the NFC reader at waist level, instead of on top of the turnstile gate where the MetroCard swipe reader is. If you keep your phone or your purse on your right side it could be easy to get too close and set it off. 

Mike Wuerthele said:

n2itivguy said:

5G is 5G regardless. There’s a slower and a faster version, but it’s all 5G. IMHO, a more steady and useable 5G (slower) is a better start than the unsteady (difficulty penetrating, etc.) faster 5G one. 

There's also almost no point to 5G from a network speed and usability standpoint without the faster mmWave.

Today, yes, but beam forming and massive MIMO, which are part of the 5G spec and will eventually be rolled out, will allow more simultaneous users to be slotted into a block of low band spectrum, thereby increasing reliability in heavily congested areas.