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  • Showing only topics in ~tech with the tag "usa". Back to normal view / Search all groups
    1. I filed a complaint against Amazon to the US Federal Trade Commission

      Mods: I put this in Tech because Amazon is a tech company, if this is the wrong group I apologize. For the last several purchases I have made through Amazon, not only has the advertised "expected...

      Mods: I put this in Tech because Amazon is a tech company, if this is the wrong group I apologize.

      For the last several purchases I have made through Amazon, not only has the advertised "expected delivery date" been wrong, Amazon hasn't even shipped the product by the delivery date. The day I expect an order to arrive, I get a notice from Amazon saying it's "running late" and the new expected delivery date is anywhere from 4 to 10 days away.

      This is on top of the fact that I have Amazon Prime. Prime eligible meant "it would be delivered within two days" for the better part of a decade. They slowly transitioned away from that to "two days delivery after it ships," and now it seems like half of everything takes 5-8 days to deliver, even with Prime.

      Anyway, the reason I reported them to the FTC because I believe they are advertising misleading or downright incorrect delivery times in hopes of winning your business over a competitor who is honest about their delivery times. If I want a monitor and Best Buy has it for $200 with 3-5 day shipping, and Amazon advertises it being delivered on day 3, I'm probably going to go with Amazon if I'm in urgent need of a monitor. But then the third day rolls around and Amazon indicates "oh, well, it's probably going to be 3-4 more days." If I had known that, I would have just gone with Best Buy, where I know it would have at least been delivered in 5 days; now I'm stuck waiting a week for Amazon.

      I don't even know if this is something the FTC cares about. But it should. I encourage everyone to report this if they've encountered the same issue.

      80 votes
    2. Lockheed Martin teases next generation aircraft

      Recently Lockheed Martin put out a post on social media [1] where they showed a silhouette of a yet-to-be-revealed aircraft. Most people seem to believe it will be the reveal of their entry to the...

      Recently Lockheed Martin put out a post on social media [1] where they showed a silhouette of a yet-to-be-revealed aircraft. Most people seem to believe it will be the reveal of their entry to the NGAD program [2] (Next Generation Air Dominance).

      While not much is publically known one interesting tidbit is how much it looks like the silhouette of the Testor Corp [3] F-19 [4] model that was released back in the mid 80s. Testor said at the time that the model was based on intelligence (aka leaks) of what would eventually become the F-117.

      Aviation forums in the past have said F-19 model is what they WANTED the F-117 and it does look quite a bit like the Have Blue [5] test craft they built, however, the legend is that they couldn't get the math to work for radar deflection properly at that time due to lack of computational power and ended up with the geometrically simpler F117 design we got.

      [1] Lockheed Martin Teaser: https://theaviationist.com/wp-content/uploads/2023/07/LM-NGAD-story.jpg
      [2] NGAD: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Next_Generation_Air_Dominance
      [3] Testor F19: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Testor_Corporation#F-19
      [4] Testor F19 Image: https://test803.files.wordpress.com/2018/10/img_6712-1.jpg
      [5] Have Blue: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lockheed_Have_Blue

      34 votes
    3. Looking for advice on getting a cheap prepaid plan in the US for a couple of months

      I have someone visiting the US from out of the country. They have a Google Pixel 6a, just need a temporary plan for a month or two. Mostly they're going to be home within wireless range, we're...

      I have someone visiting the US from out of the country. They have a Google Pixel 6a, just need a temporary plan for a month or two. Mostly they're going to be home within wireless range, we're just looking for a little bit of data while going out. I imagine a few tens of MB/mo will suffice. Has anybody tried to do this recently? What should I expect to pay? I'm looking on Amazon, and the reviews seem filled with stories of being sold pre-expired SIMs.

      12 votes