lomatopo

Of course we've got no problem using Native American images....

In the TV spot, the daughter has a complexion as white as a polar bear, after she enjoys her Charcoal Donut, she turns black. The creators probably thought it was "cute", but in a country which has a tendency to think of beauty/class as directly related to fair skin, it might be sending the wrong message? I mean most Thais might think this donut will make their skin darker so they might not buy it? Is a vanilla donut coming soon?

I might have pitched a Panda in the role, given how popular that one with the TV show is. Then maybe have a pile of bamboo or the donut, he chooses the donut and voila, all black? Or maybe the Kiwi Rugby team? They could be doing the Hakka, have some yummy charcoal donuts, then turn "All Black"?

My first thought was, what the f*** is a charcoal donut? It sounds pretty awful. If it's a chocolate donut then maybe try to convey that concept. A charcoal donut sounds like something I might use to start a barbeque?

Who knows what DD's local franchisee, his daughter and their ad agency were thinking? They probably didn't even realize what they were portraying might have negative connotations in other countries? So given they are clueless their intent was not racist. It's not at all unlike the local Hitler Fried Chicken shop; that nimrod had no clue how offensive some/many/all in other countries find Hitler's image. No bad intent, just clueless.

That said, the woman appears to have a nose piercing, I honestly can't tell for sure as most of the images available on the internet are not very hi-res, which would make the image appear extremely unacceptable and would be labeled racist in the U.S., save perhaps by a jury of six non-black women in Florida.

The TV spot is a bit more reasonable, and even puts the print ad in a bit of context. Probably OK for promoting a donut in Thailand. The folks back in Canton may not be copying this campaign in the U.S. But how's about a new Buddha donut?

Believe you need an iPhone 5 (GSM Model A1429), iPad 4 (GSM Model A1460) or Ipad Mini (GSM Model A 1455)

which are the variants that support LTE Band 1.

You can check here:

http://truemoveh.truecorp.co.th/checkdevice

I stayed a whole week in the Majestic Grande last year and was very satisfied

Can you comment on the noise from the motorway, and constant railroad noise (transporting industrial chemicals from the port)? Did you notice these at all? I assume a room facing east (onto Soi 2) would be preferable?

R for Roaming won't appear when on the DTAC 2100 as that is their new home network. It will only appear when on 850Mhz

It sounds as though you manually force your phone to use 850 MHz? So is there an "R" displayed, near/adjacent to your "bars"?

Is it possible to do this on TG's website? Or via their mobile app.? Maybe with a PNR and last name?

Note that TG do have frequent aircraft substitutions on some routes as they rotate aircraft, which means you might lose a preferred seat. So you may wish to monitor your reservation periodically?

Every fare bucket, in this case BKK-PNH-BKK, there are three Economy fare buckets: Flexi, Flexi Saver, Flexi Saver Plus, have different rules re: validity (30/90/180/360 days) changes, changes before travel begins and change after travel has begun, and any potential re-routing.

The trick is to buy the fare/bucket which best suits your requirements.

Flexi Saver Plus, the lowest priced fare bucket has the most restrictive terms, including a 3,000 baht change fee, and a possible requirement to "buy up" to the enxt available fare bucket.

Flexi Saver appears to allow changes before travel, on the outbound sector if pushing out rather than in, but for a fee of 1,000 baht plus a potential add./collect on a buy up. After travel has begun the return can be changed without a fee.

Flexi's change rules are the same as Flexi Saver.

Based on my understanding of your situation, the fare rules call for a 1,000 baht fee to push your departure date out on BKK-PNH-BKK with a TG/Flexi Saver. Not sure what it is, exactly, that you are saying, but the implication is that TG might waive this 1,000 baht fee?

Most GDS'es support 330 days.

Some airlines allow up to 364/5 days for award travel, or direct bookings.

One can issue a ticket, with a return within 330 days, and then change the return, but changes may incur a fee.

While AIS has some 1800 MHz spectrum that is devoted to DPC customers, it is not used by AIS/One-2-Call customers, and the associated concession for that spectrum/bandwidth expires on Sep. 15, 2013, as does TrueMove's 1800 MHz concession. Well that's what is supposed to happen.

AIS/2100 MHz 3G customers can roam onto the legacy 900 MHz (GSM and/or 3G, location dependent), if they are outside of 2100 MHz coverage. I'm not sure how the AIS-TOT (2100) roaming tie-up is supposed to function going forward?

So, I guess Voice and SMS continue to ride on the DTAC 1800Mhz frequency (always a strong signal anywhere I’ve went) and don’t ride on the DTAC 2100 or 850Mhz 3G frequencies.

That would be a wrong guess.

All the DTAC customers I've helped this last week seem happy with the new network; I've had no complaints - and some of these folks complain about the slightest issue. As far as I can tell most stay on 2100 MHz but some have said they have seen "E", which means they're on GSM1800 for voice, text and data. None have reported seeing an "R" so my sense is that this may be phone dependent, and not all phones display "R" unless they are truly on a different provider?

It is ON by default (a Nokia cellphone). From memory *129*2# on ? and *129*1# off ?

For AIS/One-2-Call, with any make/model phone the mobile data toggle codes are:

U.S. military officers have deep doubts about impact, wisdom of a U.S. strike on Syria

Given the emotional rhetoric, and name-calling, it seems like the results of the vote came as a surprise. The Conservative Whips must have thought/assumed they had a majority, but maybe they should have waited a bit, twisted a few arms, just to make sure they wouldn't suffer this ignominious defeat?

One assumes that some subsequent claimed action in Syria, or last-minute intelligence, which allows for another vote could change the outcome.

Not sure Obama might do, we're heading into a long holiday weekend in the U.S., which may, or may not, constrain him. Hopefully whatever he decides is part of a well thought out plan, rather than just a quick raining down of missiles meant to "teach" someone a lesson?

I stumbled across this SARL timetable app. I cannot vouch for accurate it is. It looks like it uses the published on-line schedule, and the clock to estimate the next available trains?

Obviously an app. which was linked directly into the SARL real-time database would be cool.

https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.pprajak.arl&hl=en

I stumbled across this Thai Airways Android app. Reviews seem mixed, and not sure how functional it might be. I do not have any bookings, nor am I a ROP member so I cannot verify functionality.

** Full Disclosure: I do not work for Thai Airways, Google/Android or the company which developed this app.

https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=org.me.thai&hl=en

If it was a data leak you would have lost your 111 baht balance in ~ 90 minutes.

Did you receive any unusual SMSes?

When did you buy the SIM? Can you share any details on the SIM? Promotional name?

My best guesses are either

1.) you've accidentlaly registered for some SMS delivery service: Picture of the Day, Facebook notification, Horoscope, Lucky Lottery, etc.

or

2.) Your SIM is some sort of promotional SIM which has a bundled service, like 99 baht, which got deducted as soon as you added value.

If you can't figure it out maybe best to ring 1175, or stop by a full service AIS shop to ask what me happening. I doubt it's a scam, but everyone has a different definition of that word.

I apologize. I misunderstood the OP's first statement:

"Tried at the local Express this morning and the lady flat out told me that they can't scan bar codes when they're on a phone."

to mean that he was told they can't scan the loyalty card account bar code, rather than they tried first, failed, then was told they can't scan bar codes.

And I did not read the follow-on post:

"But, the scanner at the store was unable to scan the barcode displayed on the iPhone screen."

which clearly and obviously explains that the scanner failed to read the bar-code.

Syria crisis: Downing Street fury over Labour stance

A row has erupted over No 10's claim Labour is giving "succour" to Syria's regime by not backing the prime minister over military action there.

Labour is demanding an apology for what it describes as "infantile" comments.

Downing Street is reported to be furious that Labour leader Ed Miliband has not backed David Cameron's motion paving the way for military strikes.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-politics-23862114

1. This note sets out the UK government’s position regarding the legality of military action in Syria following the chemical weapons attack in Eastern Damascus on 21 August 2013.

https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/chemical-weapon-use-by-syrian-regime-uk-government-legal-position/chemical-weapon-use-by-syrian-regime-uk-government-legal-position-html-version

Samantha Power, born in Ireland by the way so understand her lividity/lividness with those namby-pamby Brits - who is Ms. Rice's successor at the U.N., and Susan Rice, National Security Advisor, seem hell-bent on asserting their will on the Syria situation. Ms. Rice seems especially "scorned", presumably with an eye on future political positions, while attempting to distance herself from the Benghazi incident. She seems to have the POTUS's "ear" so to speak.

The vote in Parliament was pretty close, 285:272. Certainly closer than representative public opinion.

Shouldn't take long to dredge up some "yellow-cake" intel. supporting scary intents, which will sway the public, and seven MPs?

Follow the yellow-cake road.

U.S. spy network’s successes, failures and objectives detailed in ‘black budget’ summary

The $52.6 billion “black budget” for fiscal 2013, obtained by The Washington Post from former intelligence contractor Edward Snowden, maps a bureaucratic and operational landscape that has never been subject to public scrutiny. Although the government has annually released its overall level of intelligence spending since 2007, it has not divulged how it uses the money or how it performs against the goals set by the president and Congress.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/world/national-security/black-budget-summary-details-us-spy-networks-successes-failures-and-objectives/2013/08/29/7e57bb78-10ab-11e3-8cdd-bcdc09410972_story.html

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-srv/special/national/black-budget/

UK's Cameron loses parliamentary vote on Syria action

British Prime Minister David Cameron lost a vital parliamentary vote on Thursday night meant to pave the way for Britain to join a looming military strike on Syria, in a move that appeared to all but rule out British involvement in such action.

In a humiliating and unexpected development, Cameron and his coalition government failed to pass a motion that would have authorized military action against Syria in principle by 285 to 272 votes.

Cameron said afterwards he would not override the will of parliament and approve military action, saying it was clear that lawmakers did not want to see a military strike on the Syrian government to punish it for an illegal chemical weapons attack in the suburbs of Damascus last week.

http://www.reuters.com/article/2013/08/29/us-syria-crisis-britain-vote-idUSBRE97S18K20130829

Just as additional FYI on DTAC 2100Mhz signal level in Bangkok

Other than these differences in signal strengths, which sort of make sense given that DTAC, and AIS and TrueMove H, have likely co-located some of their new 2100 MHz radios where they have existing base-stations, have you observed any differences in voice, text and data performance? You know, those things most people use their phones for, when they aren’t measuring dBm of course.