Doctor Who gets a sex change.

[patricialacey]

I loved Red Dwarf. I just watched their last episodes this summer again because I had forgotten a lot of what they were about. Don't know if I want to hear his music though.

In that case maybe you will enjoy this
 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jmU2wxeHg8U

[Betty]

?

[patricialacey]

what do you mean "?"!!!!!
IT'S THE CAT!
Danny John Jules is the cat from Red Dwarf!
call yourself a smeghead?
P.S. Check out the motorcycle and leathers he arrived wearing!
do you think he's trying to tell us something?

[Betty]

Oops. I was on my small cheap android tablet at the kitchen table when I saw it on a 7 inch screen. I didn't recognize him, & didn't remember his name.

I have my desktops on big screens, & a couple older laptops that run as good as most new ones in the stores. But most of the time when going room to room, with COPD, juggling an O2 hose or O2 storage bags, while 2 cats are cutting in front of me, I like carrying around my super light tablet, that fits in my back pocket.

But I stop here on my 4.5" phone too. I think it's important that I try to use Betty's on small devices. Some hours of the day more than half our visitors are on portable devices... mostly android phones with screens 5 inches or less.

More that 1/3 of our users, & internet users don't even have a computer, where all their internet access is on an android phone. So I have to make sure Betty's works easy on them.

Most users here are on android phones, followed by Windows 7 users, then Windows 10, then iphones, then Apple tablets, then Linux PCs (but android, chrome books, & Amazon Fire are technically Linux too), then Macs, then XP, then Amazon fire.

I got a laugh reading about my former employer just buying the newest iphone for $1000. He breaks them once or twice a year. My newest phone cost $49, 2 years ago & does everything his phone does. It still runs great. But it's my backup phone in case my favorite one ever dies. But they never break.

My favorite phone is a Samsung smart phone. It's almost 8 years old. I got it for $45 with a mail-in rebate & a 1 year commitment to T-moblile back then. Still works like new. Just got a new battery for it for $5 last month. You can't even replace the battery on an iPhone.

All my phone & tablet batteries last about 5.5 hours playing video or movies, about 8 hours surfing the web, 3 days making phone calls or texting, almost a week on standby, & will keep almost a full charge for months turned off.

The other newer back-up phone plays HD video better, & handles overloaded web pages better than the very old Samsung. But for phone calls, text, as my portable music player, taking pictures, or making videos, my old Samsung is the best.

[Angela M...]

hey Betty, I am still using a Samsung flip phone I got years ago. I only make a few calls a month and one or two text messages. People insist I get a smart phone but it would be a waste of money for me.

[Betty]

But you can visit Betty's or porn in privacy with your own little pocket device... in the bathroom, shed, garage, etc. Download, & save private or personal stuff on a tiny 1/3 x 1/4 inch removable SD card that can be hidden anywhere, or inserted into a thumb drive adapter for computer access. 

Of course, if your computer is hardwired into your connection, you'll need a cheap wifi router to get the internet at home on a phone or nice pocket android tablet for under $50. Your computer can still be plugged into it.

You don't want to use a data plan on the phone to get on the internet if you don't have to. Just get on it with wifi & keep your phone plan the same as it is. Most towns have free wifi spots. Also many shops, stores, restaurants, & bars have free wifi.

You can use the wifi privately, parked nearby outside, or in another building near it.

I visit at least one of my sites & other sites at least once every 2 days (sometimes more), while I'm sitting on the toilet with my phone or my $36 7 inch quad core android tablet. With COPD, it takes me a lot longer to go poo than it used to, so I might spend a lot of time sitting in the bathroom. I have to keep stopping to catch my breath between drops, & wipes. Then when I'm all done, I just sit there & catch my breath some more.

You can also catch a movie, TV show, or video in the middle of the night or in bed, with earbuds on so you don't disturb anyone. A 4.5 inch screen is fine up close... get reading glasses if you need them for something that small. They do make affordable ones 5-6 inches too. 7 inch android tablets are cheap too. A 7 inch tablet will fit in your back pocket or coat pocket, & is no smaller then reading a paperback book. With earbuds, or external pocket or portable speakers, it makes a great music or media player too.

Sitting outside & the weather is changing? You don't have to run in to see a weather update, or view the weather radar. Just pull out the phone, & visit your favorite weather site, from your bookmarks in phone's browser. Don't bother with weather apps. They're BS spyware or adware, that will just bog down the phone.

With several computers & laptops inside my smaller place, & being homebound, I probably didn't need a little tablet or smart phone. But it is damn handy around the house, & I get them cheap.

My first truly smart phone, I got 8 years ago when I was still working full time. I got it new for $45 with a mail-in rebate. I needed to stay connected at work... and sometimes for work. It still works fine too, but it is way out of date, & the 3.5 inch screen is too small for regular web pages... but it does have the zoom function. Interestingly, I can type on it just fine, but not as fast as on a computer keyboard.

Taking pictures, movies, or sound recordings with it is damn handy too. I still use it as my regular phone for calls, texts, & as my pocket music player.

The old phone isn't update-able anymore. It also only had a 480mhz (not ghz) single core processor, 256mb (not gb) of memory, & 128mb of RAM. Put a 32gb fast SD card in it though. I could still visit low resource hungry pages like Betty's & even view videos here from our own servers or in our movies section. The media at Betty's is specifically designed to be low resource & bandwidth hungry. That's probably why we're so popular on people's phones. Even old or cheap ones still work here.

But that old phone would just poop out visiting Facebook, YouTube, & most news media websites... the web resource hogs of the world. Seriously, you can watch a full movie here in almost HD quality, & use less CPU power & bandwidth than visiting just one of those web pages just once.
 
A couple years ago I found a deal on a newer phone with a bigger 5 inch screen, & newer software for only $49. It's only a dual core 1.3ghz CPU at that price, with 8gb of memory, 2gb or RAM. I put a very fast 32gb SD card in it too. I don't load up my phone with a lot of pointless apps, games, spyware, & adware, so it does fine anywhere on the web. It takes great pictures & videos too.

I do have 2 browsers installed in it for all my needs. Firefox & Opera. I don't even have a weather, web media, or web radio app installed in it. I do everything online browser based like one would do on a computer. If I want weather, I just go to my favorite weather site directly from my bookmarks in my browser. I don't have a Facebook or YouTube app in my phones either. I have bookmarks to them in my browser.

90% of all the apps people have in their phone they don't need if they'd just learn how to use a browser & their bookmarks. Don't let the apps deliver it, just simply go there yourself through your browser bookmarks. If you don't do games on your phone or send live streams from it, you probably don't need a quad or octa core phone.

For daily use, like calls & text though, my 8 year old Samsung does better for me. So the newer phone is just a backup one. If the old one dies, or there's no power & my battery dies, I can just reach for the other phone.

I have my primary number on the old phone with T-moble. $3 a month for 30 minutes or 30 texts. If I go over it doesn't cut me off, it's only 10 cents per minute or text after, charged to my account. Calling & text through wifi is free. The newer phone with a different number is through PureTalk. I get a senior discount of $9/mo for 200 minutes or 600 texts. Calling & text through wifi is free with that one too. For wifi calling I use my free google account & number through the phones (But I pay for a Google account too -- most of our large videos are served through my paid Google account).

A former boss just got the new iPhone model for around $1000. He breaks them all the time too. His excuse this time though is his battery doesn't hold as long a charge as it used to, & the camera is better on the new one. I've seen the pictures & video he posted with the new phone. Under good light they look no better than what I can take with my phones. Under indoor or very low light, mine seem to take better pictures & video.

Never buy a phone with a non-replaceable battery. To get a shop to replace the battery will cost almost as much as a new phone... they actually have to break the phone to get at the battery. A replaceable battery in a normal phone only costs around 5 bucks. Apple deliberately put crap batteries in iPhones so when they get weak in a couple years, you buy a new phone.

[Betty]

The BBC says the newest Dr. Who episode is now available on their iPlayer. But if it was, I would have thought it would have turned up on the torrents & usenet by now, but it's not there. So I think the announcement is misleading, because it appears the newest episode available today was last year's Christmas episode.

The new episode should air Sunday. I don't believe it will be on their iPlayer service before then. I'll probably post a low bandwidth, smaller file sized copy of it after it's available for those who missed it or can't get it.

Many of our visitors have no computer or home internet connection. Many don't have cable or satellite TV either. All their internet comes through a limited or slow phone or tablet data connection, or when they're visiting a free wifi spot.

That's why we keep our sites & media very low resource hungry. Many of our movies & TV shows will even stream over very slow 48kbs (not mbs) dialup connections.

People love Betty's on their pocket devices... once they figure out to turn their phones horizontally rather than vertically. I will not be making a vertical mobile feeds of our sites, just because some people are too stupid to figure out they need to flip their phone horizontally to view the internet like everyone else does.

Unfortunately those phone & pocket tablet users are the least likely to ever join or post anything here. Without an app like Facebook has, most of them don't know how, or even realize they can join & post with their phone.

If there's not an app for that, they're totally lost, & miss out on about 90% of the internet. Their phones are slow, & they need a new $1000 phone because they have dozens of apps running for no good reason in the damn thing. They never realize that a browser with bookmarks in the phone will do everything most of those apps do, faster, safer, & more securely.

[sissybaby34]

Talking of Dr Who, some excellent versions of the theme here.https://www.bbc.co.uk/music/articles/426d1814-685a-4fcd-b425-b861c2d2c093

[Kirath]

Just watched the latest Dr Who: pretty good, and I like Jodie Whittaker with her South Yorkshire accent! I was a bit worried because the series is such a part of my life. I remember watching the first episode go out in 1964 and then being repeated the following Saturday because President Kennedy was assassinated and they feared people would not have seen it. (Not the last time Dr Who was ever repeated!) I kept on watching all of them, even when it became dull and unfashionable in the eighties. The 21st century reboot is in a different league altogether. God bless Doctor Who, the greatest television programme in the history of the galaxy!

[Betty]

Didn't care for the pre-Tom Baker series. I tried to watch & warm up to it, but it just couldn't hold my interest. Didn't like the post Tom Baker series either. It's like they changed the writing or writers. Tried to watch, but couldn't make it through an entire story.

It wasn't until they re-launched the series I enjoyed it again. But it's already is becoming a shadow of it's former self by them killing off talented doctors way too soon, switching writers too often, & limiting episodes to just a few months out of the entire year.

When is the BBC going to learn that if you have a hit, you don't constantly kill off the star/favorite performers, & severely limit the episodes to just a handful a year?

Don't let them fool you into thinking it's all because a limited budget. They're selling this show worldwide on commercial TV. Who's pocketing the money? Not the actors. As soon as they or the writers ask for a raise, they get rid of them.

If they're doing great acting & writing, you pay them, not fire them.

Don't have cable so haven't seen the new episode yet. But I did get a copy, & will probably be watching it tonight.

I'll see about a limited approved non-public/private compressed version for here later. They probably want to make as much as they can on the first episode for a week, before considering limited private versions for non-public showings.

Like most places, they won't allow private streaming of an episode, until the next episode comes out, because it's less likely they'll make much more money on the previous episode anymore by then.