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How right you sound!

I'm wondering, then, if these two deals alone made the Rambus fortune?

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http://www.iongames.org/glossary/terms.html

At least this glossary says the Expansion pack has it, and the system itself has 4mb of RDRAM...

http://www.pcquest.com/nov98/speed.asp

This site mentions the usage of RDRAM in a variety of devices, including the N64

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Why the heck is MIPs so popular?

This is a hypothetical, but if I recall correctly, Sega Saturn, N64, PSX, PS2, all use MIPs. Maybe other platforms too... but that boils down to the fact that, combined, there are many more MIPs machines out there than there are x86 machines (at least until recently, when PCs started to drop below 1k)

Then there is the issue that N64 and PS2 both use Rambus; why, oh why, would they be hurting for money? Did they happen to make a really stupid license deal, and not realize just how big Nintendo and Sony are, as regards sales of systems? Or is it, because the devices are sold at a loss, that Rambus can't actually make any money? I would have though Sony or Nintendo would suck up the difference?

I'm also wondering if there can be hybrid PS games? Games that play under PSX, but when popped into the PS2, new, additional features and options become available?

Or, as an alternative, could one use a PSX++ development system? Develop using mostly PSX libraries, and use useful supplementary PS2 technologies as needed?

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I thought the original point/argument was that teaching Visual C++ taught more on APIs than algorithms; IE, APIs at the expense of algorithms...

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Using M$ products are not evil; nor are M$ products themselves, or their employees. Rather, it is the M$ intention and means that can be questioned.

The whole issue is that M$ is making you and your peers dependent on the M$ API and toolkit; which means that you just cannot take advantage of the fact that there are, pound for pount, much more *non* M$ devices out there than M$ only. Palm Pilots, for example, and other devices, like cell phones, pagers, watches, cameras, VCRs, TiVos, PS2s, PSXs, Dreamcasts, N64s, GameCubes, GameBoys, Macs, Psions, microwaves, cars, and just about anything else with a couple hundred K of ram and a microprocessor.

Corporate America may use Windows on the desktop, but their little gadgets, tools, toys, and other such amenities aren't M$ geared, and you need to realize that. By being M$ trained, you are almost surely only capable of M$ goals, until you learn/unlearn and deal with other tools and environments.

Did you know just how hot and big Java and Linux is, right now? Well, guess what? M$ discontinued their J++ IDE and support, and have no current Linux plans or support. What are you going to do, then, if all the new hot dot-coms are running and using Linux?

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We really don't know what the hold up is; it could be anything, and we have to accept what Sony says at face value, barring some other startling revelation.

As for the RAMBUS, which is my point, that's just a low blow.

I agree that their legal tactics are dispicable, but the technology is real and demonstrated. RAMBUS has certain performance artifacts, as well as price, design, and technical constraints. For low latency, RAMBUS is a bad choice. For high throughput, it's a winner.

Which is why they happen to be in the N64 and PS2; if future developments of DDR and SDRAM change that... well, that's just speculation.

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• The Saturn had no extant game library to tap into, upon release.
  
• The PS2 can play most of the current PSX game library.
  
  
• The Saturn had no extant video library to tap into, upon release.
  
• The PS2 can play most DVDs, depending on driver software, region coding, and other hacks.
  
  
• The Saturn actually had a fairly successful launch, considering their biggest competitor was the NES(see FAQ.)
  
• The PS2's biggest competitor is the PSX, it's direct ancestor.
  

Is how many of the buyers are actually getting PS2 units for their kids?

I know *I* would like one; as would every other friend I have, and we certainly don't qualify as kids, in the traditional parents buying Christmas gifts for kids sense, though we would certainly qualify as kids in the still playing video games and reading comic books despite owning a car, having a job, and graduating from college sense.

I can't imagine how many of these consoles would be wasted on 'kids', vs being wasted on 'adults'. Who would get it for the games? Who would get it for the DVD playback? Who would get it for both?

I would imagine that the PS2 would best be targeted towards the working graduated geek who still acts like a kid demographic; we have disposable income, no kids (dinks!), and plenty of recreational habit to feed.

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I suspect that the true power of Transmeta is yet to be unleashed!

We've all seen the reviews of the P4's lackluster performance, until apps are recompiled... well, Transmeta CPUs, in theory, doesn't suffer from that problem!

What would be really powerful from Transmeta is a whole line of different CPUs targeting different markets, but able to run, relatively efficiently, an identical codebase! It's just another level of abstraction, one below ASM this time.

Imagine 4 lines of Transmeta CPUs;
a DSP like CPU handles streaming really well, targeting games or entertainment

an ultra low power ultra efficient device for sub-portables and handhelds

A power-hungry long pipeline high Hz CPU targeting the Intel mainstream

A middling class CPU that is more efficient than the Power Hungry beast, but more powerful than the ultra-low power, for mainstream CPU use

Then imagine the code that, compiled once, would run on all 4 classes of machines! Then code could be written and compiled against, say Java to be silly, and then retranslated and recompiled per architecture to best take advantage of each system. The true, real benefit, however, is the time shifting code independence. Something compiled 3 CPU generations ago will be able to run efficiently and effectively on a modern CPU, because of code morphing, where both Intel and Apple has had issues whenever the userbase needed to be moved over from one architecture to another.

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What will this do to all the planes flying around the US; the earlybird holiday travelers, as well as the normal Thanksgiving holiday travelers tomorrow...

Is there anything to be afraid of?

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First on the list, I suspect, would be...

'When is Quicktime player components going to be open sourced?'

I don't think that's going to happen, any time soon. For those people who want it as a matter of convenience (do everything in Linux!), that's all it is, a convenience.

For those who would need the Quicktime functionality... I guess it's too bad. For each OS their respective strengths, and movie/audio/media happens to be an Apple thing.

For those who would want that codecs for tinkering/development purposes... isn't that what Vorbis is all about?

'When are you going to port Aqua to the Intel world?'

We have, but since we don't make Intel/AMD branded hardware, we won't be selling the software. We would get millions in sales, as a secure, stable, BSD based Intel-platform OS, without any sales of hardware(currently), which means the only revenue model we could pursue would be updates and upgrades to the OS... Therefore shortchanging the R&D and development innovations of a floppy-less iMac, the FireWire enabled devices, the Airport capable systems, the long-battery life portables, the fanless designs, etc.

'How about your PDA plans?'

We are currently researching and developing a PDA strategy.

Now that those questions are out of the way... Hopefully more interesting philosophical/technical/social questions can be asked.

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A predator eats, consumes, and thrives on prey.

Interest and apathy are good regulators, but aren't in the same class as regulons, I don't think.

Information can spread more easily, but don't reproduce in the same way in which regulons, prey, and predators, are associated.

A moral, however, for example, can be forced into the concept. Take Wes Craven, who mutates some common morals into his horror movies. It is the person who consumes ideas, and then reproduces it in a modern format for others to consume; maybe later, some of those people will be inspired by Wes Craven, and become an author of horror stories, etc.

The ideas themselves aren't like prey or predators, but are like DNA, and shape or form the people who incorporate the stories into themselves, and shape the ideas or stories that these people later spit back out for the culture to share and consume.

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All your points are valid, concerning information, but they aren't regulons, I don't think.

They aren't predators, in the sense that they grow and thrive off the death of information!

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Though I'm not sure the term regulon has much meaning in this context, as time applies to biological entities without being considered a predator; old age, and all...

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Natural selection applies to anything in which competition, growth, and adaptation applies, assuming there is a feedback mechanism to which all the above three forces can modify something.

So websites can be 'selected' against, genres of music, or movies; but individual CDs, movies, or stories themselves cannot be.

There is an interesting analogy I thought of, in which information == DNA, and a culture, a person, or a society is the organism that uses said information. Instead of survival based on physical traits, it is survival based on behavioral traits.

The story of Skywalker, or the Mau'dib, or of Cloud Strife, affects the people who partake, and affects their behavior, and thus their chances at success, happiness, and reproduction.

But the information itself does not change, excepting in the concept of sequels, variations, etc, and that's more mutation in the fact that as an author takes in a story, his interpretations change the story subtly as he reproduces it and retransmits it.

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Accepts the premise that information spreads and grows like an organism, when it is probably more apt to ascribe properties of genes and DNA to information.

Movies, stories, news, music, etc, help to shape, teach, grow, and limit our cultures, and the value of good information is that it is absorbed by and propogated through our culture, through space *and* time. There is no regulon in this case, in the sense of a predator, but obsolescence, time, and apathy work on the information to destroy it.

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The article talks about information, exponentiality, and lack of a regulon.

Those all assume that information follows some basic rules of biology;

That information has a survival instinct. This survival instinct would force it to consume as much as it needed to reproduce, and reproduce as often as it is wont to do.

Information has no survival instinct. It is itself a consumable with very little cost. A better analogy to information is money; the value of the information is much higher than the value of the basic structure, bits or whatnot, that describe the information. In money, the denomination is higher value than that of the paper itself. That, and the potential for near limitless reproduction.

What limits money? Real value. Money needs to be assigned to something, like a car, or an apple, or a service, before it can be worth something. It is only useful insofar as it can be used. Information is similar. It's limiting factor should be the value that information is associated with it, whether it be an emotional state, a memory, a belief, or a set of instructions.

Media *only* replicates at exponential rates because there is value, and in a networked world, it will replicate as often as it's value will allow it.

The worth of a song, an image, a movie, a book, etc, determines how many copies are sold, spread, or shared. Rather than tagging it with a denomination (all CDs are about $10 in the US, or DVDs are $30, PSX games are $40, etc) the value is expressed in units produced; 1 million $10 CDs, 4 million $30 DVDs, or 5 million $40 PSX discs.

If one really wants to force an analogy to evolution, the value of the movie Unbreakable, to society, as a message about hope, or self worth, or strength, or whatever analysis you want to assign, is determined by the number of copies of the DVD, VHS, and VCDs that exist. A half million years from now, physical processes kick in, and the chance that any copy of it exists, statistically, is determined by how many copies of it exist today, in a strange quantum/statistical/radioactive half-life kind of way.

Today, how many copies of how many Greek tragedies exist? How about 1000 years from now? How many copies of the Matrix, or Unbreakable, or Crouching Tiger, exist?

Ah, if someone else wants to pursue a better analogy, information can be deconstructed to something like DNA, which by itself is fairly pointless, but within the construct of a self replicating organism, starts to become valuable, as it helps determine the survival and growth potential of the organism.

Likewise, media, information, and such are like DNA, and the value is more analogous to how well the instructions, morals, and stories help the society and culture to grow, adapt, survive, and evolve!

Say, the Anarchist's Cookbook, as a negative example!

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I was at the Alternative Press Expo a few years ago when I chatted up a cute gal at the Bunnyhop table. We talked books and I mentioned that I grew up on D.P.

At that, she made loud excited noises, jumped over the table and we did a little jig together.

Trufus factus.

I didn't get her phone number. I shall regret that for the rest of my days.

There are already some nice guides to geek (girls/guys) out there... Guide to Geek Guys and... Guide to Geek Girls