" So remember when you're feeling very small and insecure
How amazingly unlikely is your birth
And pray that there's intelligent life somewhere up in space
Cause there's bugger-all down here on Earth."
So sang Eric Idle from the Monty Python crew, and it is true, mankind has been casting its collective eyes heavenwards for the longest time to try and find signs of intelligent life out there. NASA has been doing quite a bit more than just speculate and study tea leaves, though. They have several powerful telescopes pointed heavenwards, and of course quite a few optical objecst zooming about in outer space looking for the evidence, And they haven't stopped, either. On Monday their latest telescope, called TESS, will pass the ticket gate and trundle off aboard a SpaceX rocket in search of exoplanets. We hope they find a planet. We could sell them a president,
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Everyone worth his or her salt in computing terms knows that there are two types of memory that make our beloved devices work and remember stuff, RAM and ROM. RAM is quick and essential for the device to boot up, but the synapses die when prower is removes, with the memory never to be revived. ROM stores memory long term, but it is relatively pedestrian in terms of access times (still quicker than looking it up in the library, though). Now scientists are working on a way on marrying the two memory types to produce a single offspring with the best characteristics of both. You can  efficiently store data long-term, but you can also tell the memory module how long to store short-term data (up to 3 crashes, perhaps). This is still a while in the future, though, so for now we're still lumbered with RAMROM (hey, that would be a cool band name).
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In a previous issue we touched upon  the practice of technological companies to control as much of their product post-sale life as possible, mainly by means of authorized dealer-only repairs.  We highlighted the fact that owners of even such unexpected products as agricultural implements are pushing back, claiming the right to have repairs of their machines done at repairers of their choice.  Apple is well known for coming down with a a fruity hammer upon those who would presume to effect unofficial repairs on their products, but in Norway, recently, they ended up with (apple) pie on their corporate face. The court sided with an independent iPhone repair shop owner when he would not yield to the company's bullying tactics for a relatively minor amount. It could be that the tide of sentiment is shifting against such tactics, and consumers everywhere would be all the happier for it.
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ENQUIRIES (WTB)
QTY	PRODUCT	SPECIFICATION / DESCRIPTION	TARGET
500 ea	Apple iPhone 7, 8, X	Arabic, A grade or refurbished
1 000 +ea	Moto XT1750, XT1754, XT1762,  XT1794	Euro or African
5 000 + ea	Nokia low end, 103, 105, 208
3 000	Samsung S6310T	Euro preferred
200	Samsung Galaxy Note 8
15 000 pw	Samsung various models	Smartcare stock
2 000	Xiaomi powerbank	European delivery