America's Carriers Are Terrible. It's Probably Your Fault.
A few days ago I landed in England and, expecting little, slipped an old UK SIM card into my phone. I’d bought it when living in London five years ago, and hadn’t used it in over a year. But to my amazement it was still active -- as was the money I’d added to its pay-as-you-go account sixteen months earlier...and then I received a friendly text message informing me that my data costs were now L1 per 100MB. Another SMS popped up when I emerged from the Channel Tunnel in France a few days later, informing me it would cost me 8p to send texts and 7p per minute to receive calls. Can you imagine any of that happening with an American phone company?
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Laurel Holloman's new abstract art show lands in Berlin
American painter Laurel Holloman continues her successful series of European exhibitions, after her first two solo art shows last year in Paris, France, and Venice, Italy; this time on German soil, in the heart of Berlin.
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American Executive Lashes Out at French Unions, Touching Off Uproar
The broadside by Maurice Taylor Jr. of Titan International came as he rejected France’s plea to take over a closed Goodyear plant.
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U.S. Weighing How Much Help to Give France’s Military Operation in Mali
The primary issue is whether to supply American refueling planes that would allow French jets to provide close-air support to ground forces moving north into extremist-held territory.
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mali
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France Proposes a Tax On Personal Information Collection
Dupple writes in with a story about a French proposal to tax companies that collect personal data online. "France, seeking fresh ways to raise funds and frustrated that American technology companies that dominate its digital economy are largely beyond the reach of French fiscal authorities, has proposed a new levy: an Internet tax on the collection of personal data. The idea surfaced Friday in a report commissioned by President François Hollande, which described various measures his government was taking to address what the French see as tax avoidance by Internet companies like Google, Amazon and Facebook. These companies gather vast reams of information about their users, harnessing it to tailor their services to individuals' interests or to direct customized advertising to them. So extensive is the collection of personal details, and so promising the business opportunities linked to it, that the report described data as the "raw material" of the digital economy."
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