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"First, we clamp down on boobies. Boobies on TV and boobies on the internet. Next, gwbush.com..."

Forbes have a good write up of the facts about each company here

COMCAST CORP.
FOUNDED: 1969 HEADQUARTERS: Philadelphia
MARKET CAPITALIZATION: $73.7 billion
2003 REVENUE: $18.35 billion
STOCK PERFORMANCE: up 31.27 percent in past year

WALT DISNEY CO.
FOUNDED: 1923 HEADQUARTERS: Burbank, California
MARKET CAPITALIZATION: $48.62 billion
2003 CALENDAR YEAR REVENUE: $28.07 billion
STOCK PERFORMANCE: up 45.38 percent in past year

The subdivided and affordable housing you describe sound like good ideas.

As far as nationalizing drug research, I'm skeptical. The profits drug companies make reflect the value people place on innovative drugs. It's like sports. It may seem outrageous that guys like Shaq makes millions, but if there weren't those millions to be made, the NBA wouldn't attract the world class athletes it does. I don't want an FDA quality agency in charge of curing cancer or alzheimers. I'd prefer the scientific equivalent of the Los Angles Lakers: Biotechnology All-Stars. Price controls are even more misguided. Our medical system isn't perfect, but moving it in the right direction might best be done by looking to the success of Singapore.

I just realized this is way off topic... uh, and what about those Indian programmers, huh? We're gonna have to keep sharp if those folks aren't going to make the American programmer a relic.

The subdivided and affordable housing you describe sound like good ideas.

As far as nationalizing drug research, I'm skeptical. The profits drug companies make reflect the value people place on innovative drugs. It's like sports. It may seem outrageous that guys like Shaq makes millions, but if there weren't those millions to be made, the NBA wouldn't attract the world class athletes it does. I don't want an FDA quality agency in charge of curing cancer or alzheimers. I'd prefer the scientific equivalent of the Los Angles Lakers: Biotechnology All-Stars. Price controls are even more misguided. Our medical system isn't perfect, but moving it in the right direction might best be done by looking to the success of Singapore.

I just realized this is way off topic... uh, and what about those Indian programmers, huh? We're gonna have to keep sharp if those folks aren't going to make the American programmer a relic.

Napster
-------
1. Set up music system with unrealistic price structure due to being the RIAA's gimp
2. ???
3. Loss!

Apple
-----
1. Set up music system with unrealistic price structure due to being the RIAA's gimp but wear black turtleneck and pretend to be 'the good guy'
2. Sell a crapload of iPods
3. Profit!

Don't forget Daniel Lyons' (Forbes Magazine) big bold prediction (from here):

SCO Group will settle its lawsuit against IBM. Both sides will declare victory. The Linux community will turn on IBM.

The only surprise here is that someone (Forbes) pays Dan to write this stuff (apparently the New York Times's fantasy journalism team was all filled up). Dan goes on to point out that Linux and VoIP technologies are no different than Pets.com and other marketing fluff:

technologies like Linux and voiceover-IP still involves this crazy notion that companies can make money by giving things away.

This is like Dan calling electricity a "crazy notion" because he listened to some fly-by-night business scheme involving electrical current. Looks like Forbes is got some fat to trim.

*scoove*

You say that in jest, but Daniel Lyons of Forbes has been known to quote random people from blogs as sources for his stories.

Honestly, were I his editor, I would have fired him after that. Investigative journalism it was not. This gives me very serious misgivings about trusting anything Forbes says, because I cannot imagine how that story could have slipped past even the most minimal editorial review...

It seemed rather apropos, yet disturbing, that that article was meant to be an attack on the credibility of Groklaw, after PJ of Groklaw chided him for accepting SCO's statements without any apparent research, as he had not done even the most minimal fact-checking.

I would be willing to bet that he is glad that I am not his boss... To anyone from Forbes reading this: I value research more than oppinion. And yes, I do mention your failures to anyone I know who might even think of subscribing.

Worst reporter ever. (Maybe seeing his face on Google image search for that would make his day?)

Well I would definitely recommend reading the book, but as far as insights go there are thousands. From the possibility of the universe being emulated through cellular automata, to all of physics being right but wrong and that cellular automata is the proper way to do it. He applies cellular automata to cellular growth, space time, and pretty much every area of life. He has a lot to say about generating intrinsically true randomness with cellular automata. He essentially claims that anything that ever was and will be can be explained through cellular automata. Thats a fairly broad claim, but he has the knowledge, resources, and insight to back it up. In all honesty I can't just list one insight do to the nature of how the book is interwoven, I don't have the time right now and I'd wind up citing 50 pages or so. But I do know of a forbes article, God, Stephen Wolfram, and Everything Else that may be of interest to you and does a pretty good job of summarizing what Stephen Wolfram has been up to for the past 20 years.
Regards,
Steve
P.S. If you still deny that my argument isn't strong enough, just reply and in a few hours when I have time I'll give you some irrefutable information. Take care.

You make absloutely no sense. How does giving discounts to schools makes Steve Jobs smarter than Bill Gates? Bill gates provides educational discounts and has pledged $24 billion in donations. If you want to rate someone based on their net worth, Bill Gates is worth over $46 billion dollars, Steve Jobs is $1.7 billion . If you're the richest man in the world, you're pretty damn smart in my book.

You make absloutely no sense. How does giving discounts to schools makes Steve Jobs smarter than Bill Gates? Bill gates provides educational discounts and has pledged $24 billion in donations. If you want to rate someone based on their net worth, Bill Gates is worth over $46 billion dollars, Steve Jobs is $1.7 billion . If you're the richest man in the world, you're pretty damn smart in my book.

Actually, there are some commerical companies in the US who use a modified version of what you are talking about to hawk their wares. There was a recent article in Forbes about Tremor (a word of mouth group made up for teens). Would be pretty interesting if Microsoft tried something like this and if it would work. Imagine random people getting Microsoft swag in the mail, I wonder what that would do for their image

Maybe you ought to stop berating the parent. Everyone on this post is speculating. Christ man, relax about it.
I never could understand why some people on slashdot insist on nitpicking the stupidest things. ("IBM's process by the way not apples") How you interpreted that the parent was "stating fact" is beyond me - it's called an OPINION.

He was just giving his ideas. I thought that is what slashdot was about?
by the way..

PPC 970fx
and
PPC 970fx

Now get off your high horse


I am but a sheepish little girl.

The banner ad on the page was for the BMW X3. You think Mercedes paid for it to be there?

The banner ad on the page was for the BMW X3. You think Mercedes paid for it to be there?

Try Walmart getting into the picture.

The blood is about to flow and Dell knows it. They are going to be slashing to the bone to prevent losing what could turn out to be major market share on the low end in the long run.

Eliminating the microsoft tax is one way of slashing, especially since it isn't a trivial tax. Better to test Microsoft now so they can prepare for the oncoming war, than to wait and lose market share.

Microsoft may dominate the market currently, but Dell sees the writing on the wall. It will only take one large distributor who doesn't have to pay the Microsoft tax to have a huge price advantage, and who will turn the market upside down.

This is simply Dell battening down the hatches before the storm.

Nice list, but not the one related to the article in question. Your descriptions point to this article from October 21, 2002. The linked article is from this week's January 25, 2004 magazine.

This game features gameplay elements never before seen in any other racing game! You can choose from a list of the worst cars of all time! Just think of all the fun you will have! Watch out! Don't let that Pontiac idle for too long or it might catch on fire! Better watch your back-side in your Pinto, or you might blow up! Is your Citroen SM riding a little low? Better check the suspension for leaks. All of these great features and more! Including a pong graphics engine revitalized from the 1980s with graphics so stunning, you might just soil yourself, and a physics engine written by a a two year old. If it's service recalling, repair making, engine on fire fun that you are looking for, look no further!

Unless I'm mistaken, the picture they put above "Bronco II" is actually a big ol' Bronco I.

I nominate this SCO article in Forbes as a contender for worst ever

IBM has more patents every year than any other company(like the last 5 years running i think), but I haven't seen a high-profile case where IBM went after Joe's Software Shack for IP infringement(doesn't mean it hasn't happened).

That's basically saying it's impossible to run an innovative IT company without infringing on IBM patents.

Here is one of many counterexamples to your SCO and Microsoft, et al own the media: Boise joins SCO Shakedown. Is "shakedown" a word you would expect to find in an article bought and paid for from Forbes, a business news organization. I've read many media accounts of this; they do not just parrot lies for SCO.

We have a great ally in IBM. Even if they are only our ally by neccessity, fine. The enemy of my enemy is my friend, at least for now.

Many organizations have strong lobbies in Congress. However, it is unfortunate that this will probably not come to affect the way most of us will vote. There are too many other issues.

Also, as I continue my rant, let me link this jerk who we not long ago considered to be a puppet for some organization interested in limiting our freedom to do what we want with our computers.

I'm going to post this rant again next time something dumb like this comes up early in the discussion. We have not lost the battle before it began. SCO's lawyer is clearly nowhere near perfect and IBM has an army of lawyers and a big stake in this.

This kind of reminds me of this old story.

From a link on the anti-Linux link above comes this lovely quote:

Linux geeks howled a bit, but then wrote off SCO as a bunch of sleazebags and went back to playing live-action roleplaying (LARP) games in their mothers' basements, or whatever it is they do when they're not writing device drivers and complaining about clueless end users.

Gotta love that kind of attitude in the reporting!

From a link on the anti-Linux link above comes this lovely quote:

Linux geeks howled a bit, but then wrote off SCO as a bunch of sleazebags and went back to playing live-action roleplaying (LARP) games in their mothers' basements, or whatever it is they do when they're not writing device drivers and complaining about clueless end users.

Gotta love that kind of attitude in the reporting!

And if you want to get around the $2.95 'premium archive' charge on that last article, simply add '_print' at the end of the URL, like this.

I was going to complain but, I don't think that Seth would answer, so I thought that it would be best to contact some of his co-workers to have "that chat" about SPAM. Then I thought maybe Slashdot users would like to send mail to him, so here is the list: Seth Lubove .net Letters@forbes.net customerservice@forbes.net Paul Maidment Editor, Forbes.com Executive Editor, Forbes
Charles Dubow Executive Editor, News

I was going to complain but, I don't think that Seth would answer, so I thought that it would be best to contact some of his co-workers to have "that chat" about SPAM. Then I thought maybe Slashdot users would like to send mail to him, so here is the list: Seth Lubove .net Letters@forbes.net customerservice@forbes.net Paul Maidment Editor, Forbes.com Executive Editor, Forbes
Charles Dubow Executive Editor, News

I was going to complain but, I don't think that Seth would answer, so I thought that it would be best to contact some of his co-workers to have "that chat" about SPAM. Then I thought maybe Slashdot users would like to send mail to him, so here is the list: Seth Lubove .net Letters@forbes.net customerservice@forbes.net Paul Maidment Editor, Forbes.com Executive Editor, Forbes
Charles Dubow Executive Editor, News

• Published several anti-Linux articles
• Published pro-sco articles
• And does not support Mozilla

• Published several anti-Linux articles
• Published pro-sco articles
• And does not support Mozilla

• Published several anti-Linux articles
• Published pro-sco articles
• And does not support Mozilla

• Published several anti-Linux articles
• Published pro-sco articles
• And does not support Mozilla

You don't see Forbes.COM publishing articles saying "pity the poor crack-dealers" now do you?

Actually you do

Forbs ran a "pitty the poor bud-growers" article a few months ago: link here

still looking for a fax number.

And in keeping with the current topic, this bodes to be yet another nail in the GameCube's pending coffin... especially if the prices are cut to $129. To stay competitive, GameCube games may need to drop to a regular price of $39-or-lower from the standard $49.

You think those explosions in the Australian outback are a coincidence? That ain't a fractionator mate, it's a launch tower! Those weren't gas explosions, they were rocket fuel!!! Think Dubya is being a mongrel by not signing Kyoto? It's not that he doesn't like it, just that it is irrelevant, 'cause he won't be here!!! Is he a bastard for tearing up the ABM treaty? He needs that gone so he can get his launch vehicles away! Dick's affilation with big business is just a front for the collection of global fatcats who will be riding the rocketship to freedom, away from environmental disaster.

Up until now the only bit we haven't been able to figure out has been the destination. Now we know! It's Mars!!! First stop will be the moon, from where Dubya and friends will move onto their new Martian Utopia while the rest of us fry back here on earth!!!

As I write this, I'm boucing through the outback, in a ute with my comrades, tinfoil akubra on my head. Our objective is to save civilisation from this menace . It's a tough mission, but someone's gotta do it. Wish us well and pray for us as we roll towards our destiny...

I believe SCO was well aware that their company was on shaky ground & that that was the #1 reason for their spurious attempt to force all Linux distributors to pay them a fee. SCO may not be good at making money selling software, but they are good at making money with litigation.

Barring a successful lawsuit (which now looks like a long shot), McDarl has already entertained the possibility of a buyout. This reinforces the contention that SCO was pretty wobbly to begin with.

There might be a reason that McDarl has a bit of a hardon for Novell: McBride bio.

You gotta love how Forbes always get it wrong. This Forbes article by Reed Stevenson

quotes

SCO also warned companies that they must pay to use Linux, which is based on the proprietary Unix operating system, or face litigation.


Emphasis mine of course.

Where does Forbes hire their journalist from? The local high school.

It goes without saying, but it needs to be said: SCO threatens the existence of free (as in freedom) software, and for now, IBM has taken up the sword in defense of that principle. If SCO where to somehow prevail, the nightmare of endless litigation would be of biblical proportions. No matter how you feel about IBM, SCO must be stopped.

Now after this is all over with, will I become a Big Blue groupie? Probably not. But it does influence my future buying decision when I'm looking for a new laptop built with consideration for using Linux.

I don't think they thought they would be buying the World of Pain they are walking into...

Is complete horseshit especially when you can find other links. Take for instance this link.

Enjoy the reading fellow /.ers.

But lets get a little real here about the state of the Indian university system; at best, it's grade 13.

This probably explains why so few IIT grads have been accepted into graduate school at places such as MIT, Cal Tech, or Berkeley as well as why IIT campuses rank lower in quality than nearly every other university in Asia. NOT!

It isn't just accent. It is huge, huge, huge cultural differences. Sometimes you would be able to understand their words more easily if it weren't so difficult to believe what they are saying.

About two weeks ago I was helped by a Microsoft tech support person in New Delhi, or maybe Bangalore, I forget which. Some otherwise correctly running Windows XP computers had trashed themselves so that it was impossible to run the Recovery Console. The MS tech support guy had absolutely no clue about how to fix the problem, although he did have plenty of time-wasting ideas. This is not unusual, of course. The Psychic Friends Network is sometimes equally as good as Microsoft technical support at understanding bugs in Microsoft software.

What made this technical support call different is that the Indian Microsoft technical support guy was the most arrogant person with whom I've ever talked. He made Larry Ellison look humble. He was cheerful enough, but entirely useless doing technical support because of believing that I am an inferior who should believe any lie he tells me.

After a while, for me it stopped being a support call and began to be an interesting social interaction. In Hindu culture, if you don't belong to one of the castes, you are an untouchable, a person below any of the castes. Obviously, I don't belong to any of the castes, so you know where that left me. To him, I was of the social class that cleans up after bodies that have been burned on a funeral fire, or empties latrines, or eats dogs.

Many, many Hindus are little influenced by the caste system, but this guy seems to embrace it completely. Whenever I would tell him that it was obvious that what he was saying was untrue, he would tell me another lie. No amount of mentioning that what he was saying was obviously incorrect stopped him. To him, anything that popped into his mind should be gold to someone like me. I would say, "You invented that; there's no reason to think that whatsoever", and he would just cheerfully continue with another invention.

If you aren't familiar with the arrogance and disconnection of the Hindu caste system, here is a quote: "By his very birth a Brahmin is a deity even for the gods and the only authority for people in this world, for the Veda is the foundation in this matter." -- Manusmrti 11:85.

For another example of Indian arrogance, see this story by an Indian : Hindian Arrogance on a Tourist Bus.

We hear a little about the problems of outsourcing technical support, but things are a lot worse than most stories say.

I think grandparent was referring to this:

http://www.forbes.com/technology/enterprisetech/20 03/12/16/cx_dl_1216linux.html

It was rather inflammatory.

Neato! I caught this story right when it went on slashdot's main page, 0/3 comments and got the vote tally, we can safely say that this is pre /. effect. Now, I think I know which way most slashdoteers are going to vote, and we've already seen vote skewing here when a sig told people to vote no on Verisign all through September and October (it got around 5000 votes at the end of the month as I recall), let's see how slashdot affects a slightly larger traffic/voting site:

So here are the current vote totals, pre /. effect:

24692 Responces
27% Yes
41% Not today, but maybe soon
29% Never (Likely to spike? Let's see!)
2% None of the above

Saudi Arabia and other oil producing countries argued that a planned fund under the U.N.'s Kyoto protocol on reining in climate change should also compensate oil exporters for losses if consumers shift to clean energy like wind or solar power.

Literally.

I don't know how Sony in its present day, conglomerate form can survive. Not when it has disparate business interests that do not align well. The PSX is Sony's latest shism come to life.

Will it do well?

Who knows.

But I gaurantee there are a lot of people within Sony who pray for its death, notably those in consumer electronics, film and music. There are a lot of people at Matsushita who pray it succeeds.

Sony's recent showing at the Tokyo Consumer Electronics affirms Sony's current standing.

One thing that the Review did not bring out, which I think the Book might have, is the total fixation that Ellsion has on Gates. It is almost like a fetish. The significant parts of his career can almost said to be defined more by Gates that by his ownself. Gates ain't my favorite, but Ellison is less so.

The Big Fight: Oracle vs. Microsoft "In this corner is challenger Oracle CEO Larry Ellison and the NC (Network Computer). In the opposite corner is reigning champion Microsoft CEO Bill Gates and the NetPC. The low-cost computing fight has begun. This fight between Ellison and Gates isn?t solely about low-cost computing. It also concerns who?s in charge of the computer industry and mixes in the personal animosity between the two software rivals. Referring to Microsoft, Ellison said, ?The idea the world could be controlled by one company is shocking and unacceptable.? "

There was a time when Oracle's Ellison Closer Than Ever To Richest-Man Title "Larry Ellison may spend some quality time with his calculator this week. His net worth hasn't been this close to that of rival Bill Gates since 1986--that is, figuring in only their stakes in Microsoft and Oracle. While Oracle's stock has held up well this month, Microsoft shares have fallen dramatically because of renewed speculation that the government will break up the company. As of today's market close, Microsoft Chairman Gates' stake in Microsoft is worth $49.4 billion. Oracle Chief Executive Ellison has $48 billion worth of Oracle stock."

But then it so happened Ellison was reduced to Dumpster Diving into M$ trash "Ellison maintained his company did nothing illegal in commissioning the investigation, which was revealed earlier this month after the detective agency Oracle had retained, Investigative Group International, was caught trying to buy from dustmen the office rubbish of the Association for Competitive Technology, a Microsoft-funded industry front group. To demonstrate his apparent belief that all's fair in Love, War and Corporate Public Relations, Ellison challenged Microsoft to investigate his own company in return. "We will ship them our garbage," he joked. "We will ship our garbage to Redmond, and they can go through it. We believe in full disclosure.""

Characteristically Ellison told a Forbes reporter in 1996 that he was about to purchase a T-38 Supersonic jet fighter. "Maybe I should fire a few Maverick missiles in his [Gates'] living room," he joked.

His fixation was apparent when he said ""The only software company we care about a lick ... is Microsoft Oracle is second only to Microsoft in terms of operating margin strength. And while much of Oracle's advertising is focused on its database battle with IBM, Ellison conceded that Microsoft remains his main focus. "The only software company we care about a lick ... is Microsoft," said Ellison, who also fielded questions regarding analysts' and investors' major concerns: executive departures and competition in Oracle's key database market."

In keynote speeches, informal gatherings and private interviews, "the Oracle chief slips easily into long rants on what he sees as Gates' quest to dominate everything Microsoft touches. One favorite Ellison refrain is that Gates wants a world of "Microsoft English." Ellison in recent years has built a public image around pointed attacks on his competitor Microsoft, often singling out its Chairman, rich-man Gates, as a villainous copier of technology with a misguided vision of the computer industry."

Other nice juicy Larry_Speak

One thing that the Review did not bring out, which I think the Book might have, is the total fixation that Ellsion has on Gates. It is almost like a fetish. The significant parts of his career can almost said to be defined more by Gates that by his ownself. Gates ain't my favorite, but Ellison is less so.

The Big Fight: Oracle vs. Microsoft "In this corner is challenger Oracle CEO Larry Ellison and the NC (Network Computer). In the opposite corner is reigning champion Microsoft CEO Bill Gates and the NetPC. The low-cost computing fight has begun. This fight between Ellison and Gates isn?t solely about low-cost computing. It also concerns who?s in charge of the computer industry and mixes in the personal animosity between the two software rivals. Referring to Microsoft, Ellison said, ?The idea the world could be controlled by one company is shocking and unacceptable.? "

There was a time when Oracle's Ellison Closer Than Ever To Richest-Man Title "Larry Ellison may spend some quality time with his calculator this week. His net worth hasn't been this close to that of rival Bill Gates since 1986--that is, figuring in only their stakes in Microsoft and Oracle. While Oracle's stock has held up well this month, Microsoft shares have fallen dramatically because of renewed speculation that the government will break up the company. As of today's market close, Microsoft Chairman Gates' stake in Microsoft is worth $49.4 billion. Oracle Chief Executive Ellison has $48 billion worth of Oracle stock."

But then it so happened Ellison was reduced to Dumpster Diving into M$ trash "Ellison maintained his company did nothing illegal in commissioning the investigation, which was revealed earlier this month after the detective agency Oracle had retained, Investigative Group International, was caught trying to buy from dustmen the office rubbish of the Association for Competitive Technology, a Microsoft-funded industry front group. To demonstrate his apparent belief that all's fair in Love, War and Corporate Public Relations, Ellison challenged Microsoft to investigate his own company in return. "We will ship them our garbage," he joked. "We will ship our garbage to Redmond, and they can go through it. We believe in full disclosure.""

Characteristically Ellison told a Forbes reporter in 1996 that he was about to purchase a T-38 Supersonic jet fighter. "Maybe I should fire a few Maverick missiles in his [Gates'] living room," he joked.

His fixation was apparent when he said ""The only software company we care about a lick ... is Microsoft Oracle is second only to Microsoft in terms of operating margin strength. And while much of Oracle's advertising is focused on its database battle with IBM, Ellison conceded that Microsoft remains his main focus. "The only software company we care about a lick ... is Microsoft," said Ellison, who also fielded questions regarding analysts' and investors' major concerns: executive departures and competition in Oracle's key database market."

In keynote speeches, informal gatherings and private interviews, "the Oracle chief slips easily into long rants on what he sees as Gates' quest to dominate everything Microsoft touches. One favorite Ellison refrain is that Gates wants a world of "Microsoft English." Ellison in recent years has built a public image around pointed attacks on his competitor Microsoft, often singling out its Chairman, rich-man Gates, as a villainous copier of technology with a misguided vision of the computer industry."

Other nice juicy Larry_Speak

"I thought the recording industry said that this business model wouldn't work, that people won't pay for what they can download for free?" So, there you go.

You can still make the argument that the business model doesn't work. After all, iTMS is easily the most successful of the online music stores, and it only manages to break even. Sales from the store are viewed by the company largely as a means of driving sales of iPods.

Until someone starts, as the kids say these days, "making the mad skrilla," by selling music, the assertion that the business model is really working has to be taken with a grain of salt: when only the best in the business can break even, the business model needs a serious look.

(Why I like iTMS: when my wife told me she wanted me to buy her a Christina Aguilara song, I didn't have to do the walk-of-shame at the record store, or buy a whole album of her stuff. Bought it, burned it, shuddered and tried to suppress the memory.)