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Murphy's Law: The Open-Source World is The Matrix

David Murphy — Thu, 23 Apr 2009 13:53:38 -0500

Hello, Mr. Anderson.

At least, that's the greeting I now expect to see whenever I fire up a page on SourceForge. And before you ask, no, the Wachowski brothers haven't bought the rights to the Web site. The open source software world is huge--billions of dollars huge--but trying to figure out its breadth makes me think of The Matrix. Or, at least, a construct of Matrix-like proportions.

Amazingly enough, a company called Black Duck Software has taken on the task of creating a complete and compelling picture of open source software development. And I'm not just talking about a simple Linux survey or two. Black Duck has used everything from the largest of the open-source operating systems to the smallest of massively-multiplayer frameworks to develop an epic valuation of open-source software. It's been running these numbers and scanning for projects since the company's founding in 2002, if that helps you to visualize just how deep the rabbit hole gets.

And what have they found? Enough code, representing enough cash, to create a little Matrix of your very own. According to Black Duck, there are more than 200,000 open source projects being developed or distributed on the Internet today. That represents more than 4.9 billion individual lines of code, a metric Black Duck developed by running a counting application on every source file, in every project, the company tracked. More than 4,000 individual Web sites were used to generate this large database of projects and related files.

From there, Black Duck used the Constructive Cost Model developed by University of Southern California professor Barry Boehm to determine just how much this heap of software is worth. The model estimates the number of people-hours a particular piece of software would require based on the amount of code (in thousands) that has to be generated. Different versions of the model take more complex factors into account, including estimated resource constraints, the desired software reliability, and the experience of the coders, amongst other factors. In layman's terms, the more code a person has to write multiplied by the complexity of the project determines just how much time one can expect to spend. Go figure, eh?

Running the model based on the 4.9 billion lines of code approximation from earlier, Black Duck determined that the current open source world would take 2.1 million people-years worth of development to replicate. You're either in for a long haul behind your computer, or you and your 2.099 million closest friends are racing the Shakespeare-typing monkeys to achieve a great dream. Factoring in an average United States programmer salary of around $75,000, as well as a multiplier that represents additional development costs not directly related to salaries, Black Duck generated a figure of $387 billion for just how much these 200,000 or so programs are worth.

The company also estimates that at least 10 percent of all proprietary software development is redundant, given the propensity of alternative (and less expensive) open-source code and applications. That translates out to roughly $22 billion lost in just the United States alone, or approximately $65 billion globally.

While it's difficult to find an exact replication of these figures by a third-party (Black Duck is in the business of bridging corporate business models with open-source alternatives), it's not that tough to find a wealth of stories that substantiate the basic claim that open source saves money. Companies care about saving money, especially as global financial issues plague their bottom lines. Open source is not a panacea--it's no Matrix in form or practice, but you could certainly make an argument for size.

HD-Arrrrrgh

<a href="/david_murphy">David Murphy</a> — Mon, 14 May 2007 21:24:47 -0500

Hokay. So. I'm but a lowly Associate Editor here at Maximum PC, which means a few things: I get the food orders, I barter with Norm The Intern for necessary provisions from the fourth floor, and I don't make any money. Or, rather, California expenses being what they are, I find myself slightly unwilling to sink a ton of cash into one of my lil' dreams -- a shiny new DSLR camera. And with it, a foothold into the exciting, over-stimulated (and overexposed, tee-hee) world of high dynamic range photography.

For the uninitiated, a high dynamic range photograph is a fairly simple concept. When you shoot a normal photograph that has a pretty extreme diversity of high and low light intensities, the camera nails one or the other -- the darkest blacks, or the brightest lights. But not both. For your camera, unlike your eyeball, can only process a certain range of color and light.

An image shot HDR-style is actually a composite of multiple images shot at different exposures. In this sense, you get the best of all worlds -- detail that was washed out becomes clear, the dark parts get darker, the light parts get lighter, et cetera. It's how photographers nail shots like these; which, to note, still look slightly more artistic and unrealistic to me than what one would see just by staring at said object, but are a helluva lot more interesting than what you might from a single-exposure shot.

Now back to my poverty. Since I can't afford a fancy camera, I rock with a Casio Exilim Z750; not a poor choice by any means, just totally worthless when it comes to shooting images at night (ISO 400 = noise central). It can handle multiple exposures, but here's the rub; I don't have a tripod, either. Thus, unless I want to duct-tape the camera to a stationary object every time I want to take a picture, HDR isn't in my future. Remember, an HDR combines multiple images -- the more movement between said images, the blurrier the final result. Yikes.

So it's with passing interest that I noticed an article on almighty Digg today -- How to fake HDR photos in Photoshop. Silly me, here I thought it would be as simple as editing a few exposure settings and blammo! Instant HDR. Well, that's not entirely the case. I won't reproduce the steps here; that would be stealing. But I will show you the results of my descent into fake-HDRdom, so you can judge for yourself whether the journey is worth it. I remain unconvinced.

Unfortunately, since I can't edit this page's header, you don't get fancy javascript rollovers. Uh. These aren't the droids you're looking for. *waves hand*

Mischa Found His Drink

(original | "hdr")

If this is HDR, count me out. The original picture looked just fine, and this... monstrosity... looks like a bunch of Photoshop filters threw up all over the place. The best part of the image is the end of the "Jekyll and Hyde" logo on the shirt; it looks crisp and effective. Other than that, though, I'm quite unimpressed. Maybe it was the shot?

Halfsies

(original | "hdr")

Thinking that perhaps it was the picture itself that was the issue with my first attempt, I decided to try the exact same set of layering techniques for a more traditional "could be HDR" image. While this looks a little bit better than the first image, it still looks a wee cartoony to me, as opposed to maintaining the delicate lush that is a nicely shot HDR image. As Gordon said, you can't really add detail to a picture that isn't there in the first place. I'm starting to believe in the truth of that statement.

At this point, I was surfing through the Digg comments to see if anyone else had as much not-luck with the technique as I did. Lo and behold, I stumbled across another technique to increase the overall highs-and-lows of your pictures -- mimicking the idea of HDR more than the actual effect -- without destroying the "normality" of your shots. Quoth, Elliuotatar:

"If you have an image where you have a really bright sky and/or a really dark foreground, do this in Photoshop

1. Duplicate image to a second layer.

2. Image->Adjustments->Desaturate second layer. (Make it black and white.)

3. Image->Adjustments->Invert second layer. (Make it a negative.)

4. Do a 64 pixel gaussian blur on the second layer. (Low pass filter. Prevents loss of high frequncy contrast on surfaces.)

5. Set the second layer to soft light.

And voila, bright portions of the image become darker, and dark portions of the image become lighter. And it looks a lot more realistic and better than those crappy HDR images most people put out."

Judge for yourself; here are some spruced-up images using his technique:

In White Light

(original | "hdr")

While the accidental overexposure of this shot already lent it a mysterious quality of sorts, the "Elliuotatar effect" adds a little detail to the foreground of the image. Hardly as dramatic as I expected, but every little bit helps, eh?

Nazis Bore Kittens

(original | "hdr")

The effect brings out a little detail around my sleeping cat's face (Colbert, if you were curious as to his name). However, I'm still not convinced that I like the added light. Maybe I'm just a fan of higher-contrast shots, but I feel like this has somewhat muted the original shot a little bit. And it's not like said shot was lacking in detail to begin with.

So what did this little photographic excursion teach me? Well, if you want an HDR shot, shoot an HDR shot to begin with. Trying to trick it out in Photoshop might work to your benefit, but by the time you're done futzing with "fake HDR," you could have just as easily re-shoot the image in the first place. That said, there's something nice about Elliuotatar's technique. When applied to certain pictures, it helps to add a bit of clarity that the shot might have otherwise lacked. Good to file away in your Photoshopper's toolbox, but not necessarily worth doing for every single picture you have.

It's my party, and I'll link who I want to

<a href="/david_murphy">David Murphy</a> — Fri, 04 May 2007 19:26:06 -0500

Well, it's been nice knowing you, Maximum PC readers. Because after I click "submit" on this post, it's going to be a short countdown before the first of the legal threats arrive. All because I'm using hyperlinks. Yes, that's right. Hyperlinks. Nothing is sacred in the World Wide Web anymore, as a few corporations insist on trying to place restrictions on the way in which you link to their websites. Take a deep breath, utter your favorite naughty phrase, and let's take a look at one such agreement from my dear friend Cingular:

Links to the Sites. You are granted a limited, nonexclusive right to create a hypertext link to the homepage of the Sites, provided such link does not portray Cingular Wireless or any of its products and services in a false, misleading, derogatory, or otherwise defamatory manner. You may not use a Cingular or Cingular Wireless logo or other proprietary graphic or trademark of Cingular or Cingular Wireless to link to the Sites without the express written permission of Cingular Wireless. This limited right may be revoked at any time.

IANAL, but you've got to be kidding me. Heaven forbid I say that Cingular blows, or express an equally profane displeasure at the service's tendency to drop my calls with some weird busy single. Or the fact that I think Cingular's service, as a whole, is horribly overpriced, and that I think the company gouges the customer with every worthless add-on option it offers. Nope. Can't say that; not if I want to link to Cingular, because that might be construed as misleading. Or defamatory. Or something.

I'm not going to get into the legal terms of the policy -- which make sense on their face, as the conduct Cingular describes is a basically the definition of libel. I just think it's stupid that Cingular is trying to attach a tort to a hyperlink when there's no basis for doing so. File a legal challenge to the words themselves. A hyperlink is entirely neutral. It does no greater or lesser damage to Cingular for me to combine a profanity-laden streak of lies with a way to get to the company's website. And frankly, I'm a bit taken aback that -- according to Cingular's policy -- I'm apparently entering some kind of agreement the second I start typing "a href." A hyperlink isn't a signature, especially to some arbitrary policy that's quasi-buried on a web site.

Let's continue:

ChaCha grants to you a terminable, non-exclusive, non-transferable license to (a) establish a "Link" (as defined below) to the Site, (b) use the "Logos" (as defined below) solely for the purpose of establishing the Link, and (c) publicly display and reproduce the "HTML Code" (as defined below) on your website. As used in this Agreement, the term "Link" shall mean a hyperlink located on your website which shall connect the user to the Site, and which shall be implemented by you solely in accordance with this Agreement. The term "Logos" shall mean the Search Boxes and Badges found on the "Link to Us" page of the Site, which shall accompany the Link on your website.

So not only is ChaCha ordering me to use their stupid search boxes or badges whenever I link to their site, but later on in the Terms, it specifics that I can't use the logos along content that is "distasteful," amongst other fun adjectives. Well, I guess that rules out any links from this blog!

All links to the Site must be approved in writing by GE, except that GE consents to links in which: (i) the link is a text-only link containing only the name "General Electric Co."; (ii) the link "points" only to www.ge.com and not to deeper pages;(iii) the link, when activated by a user, displays that page full-screen in a fully operable and navigable browser window and not within a "frame" on the linked website; and (iv) the appearance, position, and other aspects of the link may neither create the false appearance that an entity or its activities or products are associated with or sponsored by GE nor be such as to damage or dilute the goodwill associated with the name and trademarks of GE or its Affiliates.

Oop. Now I'm definitely not allowed to say "GE sucks," else I'll clearly be violating this ever-important policy, and will thus be unable to link to General Electric in any capacity -- a "permission" they could revoke at at any time, mind you. But what's a hyperlink, anyway? GE sucks? GE sucks, so check them out at gee-eee-dot-com? GE sucks, and their website is ge.com. Any of these more legally sound than the others? Or am I screwed no matter what?

You say Ketchup, I say catch-up...

David Murphy — Tue, 01 May 2007 20:06:12 -0500

Ahh, the grab-bag. The ancient style of column/blog writing that notoriously fills in whenever someone has nothing of pressing importance to talk about. Or, for that matter, nothing that truly warrants its own individual post. Yep, it's lazy Tuesday; we're in fourth week right now, the publication time when other editors' heads spin. As but a lowly Associate Editor, my workload slightly decreases during this time period, which leaves me free to do awesome things like: clean the labs, get burritos with Tom, and respond to reader inquiries in a blog-style format! That said...

keyboard

Submitted by D Waterhouse on Sat, 2007-04-28 02:47.
what ever happened to your keyboard?

Well, D Waterhouse, I'm glad you asked that. I had been meaning to blog about the results, but was trying to find a good way to do so in the middle of another post. Long story short, the keyboard totally works fine*. No problems to report whatsoever*. All the keys work*, all the LEDs light up, and it's as if I didn't spill an entire glass of fruit punch all over everything important on my desk.

*actually, the "x" key is a little unresponsive, but not as badly as the row of F1-F4 keys. The "x" button isn't sticky, whereas I literally have to jam F1, F2, and F3 as hard as I can just to elicit some kind of response. F4 isn't that bad, but come on. Who really uses F4. Feh.

But hey, losing four keys instead of a $100+ keyboard is a fine-enough trade off for me. I suppose I could douse the keyboard once more, and see if that alleviates the issue at all. But... I think... I'm not going to do that anymore, and just count my blessings a little bit. Yes sir.

HD-DVD Key Fiasco

As tempted as I am to post a certain 16-digit hexidecimal key, because I absolutely hate all things DRM, MPAA, and acronym'd, I'd much prefer to keep the following: my job. Or, rather, I'm not always the best responder to complaint letters, in that I'm a wee blunt. And I can't see an interaction between MPAA lawyers and myself going anywhere good, anytime fast. But I digress; if you're the least bit net-savvy (sorry, Gordon), you've surely noticed said 16-digit key bouncing around some of the 'net geek hangouts lately.

I, for one, think this is great. Not only because it absolutely ensures that anyone who ever needs to use such a key (to make a backup, obviously) will surely be able to find it, but also because it's the best "French Connection UK"-You to the MPAA that geeks can possibly give. Reminds me of that epic Star Wars quote: "The more you tighten your grip, Tarkin, the more star systems will slip through your fingers."

To be honest, I don't see what the big deal is anyway. Let's not kid ourselves here; HD-DVD, Blu-Ray, whatever. The format is irrelevant. High-quality movies will still float around the warez circles, the Usenet, The Pirate Bay, et cetera. The cracking and distribution methods have worked successfully for years, and thanks to Bittorrent, this quasi-hidden society has practically opened up to everyone.

There are simply too many leaks in the system -- and too many industrious scenesters -- to ever stop the release of free copyrighted content. It's as if the MPAA thinks that people are going to use said 16-digit code to start cracking their own movies at home. Screw that; in the time it would take me to bother with that, I could have just downloaded the movie.

Child porn case shows that an open WiFi network is no defense

This article made me sad. Not because of the child pornography implications, but because it's the first step in destroying my favorite theory as to how one can evade a copyright lawsuit -- leaving the ol' router open. At least, were I to be of the illegal downloading type, that's the first thing I would do; pop on the WiFi, "forget" the password, and grab all the Battlestar Galactica I can.

Granted, this was a bit of a different case, in that the cops ended up finding CDs child pornography in the guy's room. The open WiFi defense really doesn't work when you have all the evidence for a conviction sitting in your room. But still, I would venture that said defense is still a little risky to use. I assume you'd have to offer some kind of concrete proof that another computer accessed your WiFi, as opposed to just saying, "well, it could have happened." And still, how many of us actually have some kind of real defense (aka: hard drive nuke) in place, just in case the ol' C&D comes a-heading our way? Shrug. As always, download at your own risk! ; )

An End of an Era

David Murphy — Fri, 27 Apr 2007 19:38:07 -0500

With a heavy heart, I'm forced to report to our readers (all Jon Phillips' s idea, mind you) that a great tragedy has befallen Maximum PC today. Fort Murph, proudly erected in the heyday of the magazine's May review schedule, has finally fallen.

A testament to ingenuity, and a perfect cover up for its creator's "emo" behavior, Fort Murph gained its footing as the icon of the magazine soon after its construction. Passersby would often stop and marvel at its appearance, nearly silenced by its great majesty. Nearly, mind you. Visitors were often known to exclaim such queries as, "is that going to go to the ceiling," and, "you made a what?"

Suffice, these were the same pilgrims that would often swing by Fort Murph to partake in its hefty supply of necessary provisions: mountain dew, scotch tape, and scathing wit. When it wasn't serving as the company's personal Statue of Liberty, Fort Murph doubled as a conference room. It brought joy to visiting children, and infused vendors with excitement and a newfound sense of purpose -- when they gazed upon the mighty cardboard for the first time, they realize that, indeed, a New World was waiting for them.

With the tragic loss of Fort Murph, we can but wonder what new engineering design will take its place. Will it be made of streamers? Packing peanuts? Old magazines? Or is this but the sign of a new generation? Has the time of monuments and heroes passed, never to return? It's too soon for this proud host to say. It takes all of my heart to maintain a sense of resolve and purpose, for looking out past my cubicle is but a bin full of empty boxes. Broken dreams, you could say.

A toast to you, Fort Murph. May you find a better life... elsewhere.

Vigor Gaming Force Recon QXN

David Murphy — Thu, 26 Apr 2007 14:15:39 -0500

Welcome to another edition of Maximum PC Theater. For our main attraction this evening, we’re featuring a play by Vigor Gaming entitled Force Recon QXN. There’s a scene in act 1 in which the computer utterly fails to run in any useful capacity… it brings tears to our eyes. Be sure you don’t miss it.

Or, rather, do miss the Force Recon QXN. As has become an unfortunate tradition at Maximum PC, we again find ourselves with a system that looks sweet on paper but utterly fails the quality assurance part of the benchmarking process. In layman’s terms, it does not work. It fails to boot consistently. It fails benchmark runs.

We blame overly aggressive overclocking for this electronic disaster. Like those who came before it, Vigor cranked an Intel QX6700 quad-core processor from the stock speed of 2.66GHz to a mighty 3.46GHz. But we certainly don’t blame the company for doing so; in today’s extreme-computing (and non-multicore-supported) environment, a stock-clocked quad-core processor simply can’t hold up to dual-core clock speeds.

See that wiring job? Now that’s quality work. At least your new footrest will look great.

If only Vigor had spent as much time testing the machine as it put into its appearance, we might have had an actual working computer. This system is loaded with more tweaks than any of the similarly configured quad-core machines we’ve reviewed, so we were a bit surprised to see lower frame rates in all of our gaming tests (when they ran). Our quad-champion Maingear F131 (reviewed in our January 2007 issue) destroyed the poor Force Recon by almost 15fps in FEAR and 20fps in Quake 4.

Application testing painfully highlighted the Force Recon’s stability problems, particularly our standard video encoding test, in which we use Nero Recode to transform a DVD-quality rip of Terminator 2 into an H.264-based video iPod file. It’s as if the Force Recon took one look at the project and decided to head out for a smoke break. The process took nearly 40 minutes to complete, almost double the 22-minute score the Maingear laid down.

We were beginning to wonder if we should just take this sick machine out back and shoot it, but the Force Recon didn’t even make it out the door. The machine officially died during our Premiere encoding test. No blue screen, just random restarts.

When SYSmark caused the same problems, we set all the components back to stock clock speeds, but the system got progressively worse. After Force Recon started to reboot spontaneously, we gave Vigor a call, and the company sent us a recovery-disc image.

Said recovery disk ended up destroying what was left of the system. Windows barely made it to the loading screen before blue-screening.

The final nail in the Force Recon’s coffin is that it actually ran slower than all of the other nonworking systems we’ve tested, at least in the benchmarks we got to run. That’s certainly not something to be proud of.

Stay off my computer/console, you!

David Murphy — Tue, 17 Apr 2007 14:40:44 -0500

Having been a PC gamer since Doom Shareware, a console gamer since the Power Glove, and a computer enthusiast since the Commodore 64, I feel absolutely compelled to get up on my high horse and say what legions of gamers are (or should be) yelling at the top of their lungs: stop. porting. games.

Yes, that's right. In a Dave-centric world, there would be none of this Games for Windows crap. You would never see a game, regardless of its success, cross from the living room to the home office. Halo would stay on the Xbox, Command and Conquer would stay on the PC, and Sony would. Well. Do whatever it is Sony's doing right now. That weird blend of Xbox achievements and Miis that just reeks of idea theft.

But I digress. Surely anyone who's ever used a mouse and keyboard to waste hours upon hours in virtual ass-kickery will attest that certain games only work on certain platforms. That's it. Anything else is a heretical version of an awesome, original experience, and were it up to me, such extensions would be not only banished, but punished. I'm looking at you right now, EA. Were it up to me, the Witch-King would stay in Computer-dor, and never venture out into Middle Console.

Similarly, any adventure-themed games would immediately be relegated to consoles. Yes, they might play a little better with a mouse. But I simply cannot fight the temptation to alt-tab out to gamefaqs on my home rig whenever I'm in a trouble spot. At least having a console in the other room allows my laziness to force me into playing the game sans FAQ/walkthrough/whatnot.

So where, then, does that put the elephant in the room: first-person shooters? I'm a bit torn on this point, as my agility playing Goldeneye is akin to James Bond on elephant tranquilizers. I'm no Johnathan "THX1138-or-whatever" Wendel, but I can at least pull off quite a few headshots in Unreal Tournament. At least, until the console version comes out; then it's back to square one.

But to exclude all FPS games to the PC would be to deny the greatness that is a game like Gears of War, which partly thrives on the difficulty of an average gamer's ability to be able to pull off those uber-sweet shots with a console stick. Case in point: I've had many a shotgun-themed discussion with Will that's ended with us stupidly circle-strafing each other, firing like lunatics at a country wedding. Were we rocking the mouse-and-keyboard, though, odds are good that one of us would not make it past a second shell. The difficulties in precision targeting define the experience and -- I can't believe I'm saying this -- make the multiplayer matches a bit more exciting than trying to go up against someone who actually uses different mouse-weight things for different games.

I could go through all the game genres, but that's why The Good Lord invented lists. With that said, I present to you the ever-so-brief, "I don't want to play it if it's not on this device" selections:

THE PC

Real-Time Strategy -- Zerg rush? More like a Zerg trickle, because you simply cannot play with speed if you're using a d-pad. Impossible.

First-Person Shooters -- Two equally skilled players. Same game. A PC head-shotter will kick a console player's ass any day of the week, hands down. And if you disagree, I will fight you Ron Burgundy-style.

MMORPGs -- I don't care how fancy your keyboard add-on is for your Xbox controller. MMORPGs were made for the pc, not only for the sheer number of things you can map to a keyboard, but also because of the customizations that you can add into a PC game. Sorry, UI hackers; no console for you. Nor soup. Nor Pony.

THE CONSOLE

Sports Games -- There is no reason why you should be playing NCAA-anything on your keyboard. It worked for Techmo Super Bowl, it worked for Madden '94, it worked for Mutant League Everything -- controllers are a perfect input device. Blow the final whistle.

Party Games --Here's looking at you, Wii. And really, any game that encourages three or more people to get together, eat food, and mash greasy hands into buttons for hours on end. LAN parties are fun, but there's no way you're going to get anyone casual interested in joining your fun.

Flying/Racing/Whatever -- Simply put, if it requires some kind of joystick to operate in real life, there's no reason why you should be mashing W, S, A, or D to do so in virtual life.

Pertelian X2040

David Murphy — Mon, 16 Apr 2007 14:35:16 -0500

Using the Pertelian X2040 display is about two steps away from having a data feed shunted into your arm as though you were one of Battlestar Galactica’s Cylons. If you can’t bear to be disconnected from real-time information feeds, this device will keep you up to speed.

The Pertelian certainly has a geeky appeal. The device connects to your PC via USB and consists of a four-line LCD panel that serves as a scrolling meta-information display. Using a somewhat-clunky configuration utility, you can pick from a host of plugins that will output data to the Pertelian’s 1-by-3-inch screen, including what’s playing on your iTunes, the latest news on your favorite RSS feeds, and who’s on your current TeamSpeak channel.

You can also use the Pertelian as a supplemental screen for your IM and IRC clients. Incoming instant messages will pop up on the Pertelian’s screen (the client supports Gaim, Yahoo Messenger, and AIM), where your typed responses will also appear—an intriguing idea for gamers who don’t want to quit conversations while fragging. In practice, it’s a bit tough to navigate a flurry of IM conversations.

Once you start chatting with more than one person, you’re better off just alt-tabbing to your main display. And that’s assuming your IM conversations even get picked up—some don’t—and you can only respond to messages; you can’t initiate an IM conversation. Also, sometimes the device locks out your entire keyboard, rendering it useless until you reset the Pertelian. D’oh!

The Pertelian’s accompanying software looks like it was hacked together at the last minute—and performs like it. Either the unit or the utility occasionally forgets the other exists, which forces you to restart the software, reconnect the Pertelian, or do a mad combination of both.

The device’s hotkeys could also be better labeled in the utility, which would spare you from sifting through the device’s lengthy PDF manual. We actually found it easier to just button-mash our way into figuring out commands for each plugin.

We definitely began to enjoy the Pertelian the more we used it, but it doesn’t quite escape the event horizon that separates “neat gimmick” from “must-have device.”

Update: The printed article incorrectly stated the MSRP as $70. The Pertelian's actual MSRP is $49.