Slashdot Mirror

On our Distributed Systems final, we had a question about using an airplane full of CDs being used to replace our school's internet connection. The point was the even though the plane offered 10,000 times more bandwitdh, the 80 minute latency meant it wasn't a viable replacement.

Jason
ProfQuotes

I thought it was a sequel to the Sandra Bullock movie, 28 Days.

Jason
ProfQuotes

That site you're working on is an example of why the ADA is very important

Jason
ProfQuotes

What does that have to do with the product itself?

Sorry I didn't make it clear. Where do you think the company gets the money to run the ad? By buying the product, you are paying them to annoy you.

Jason
ProfQuotes

That's not random; you have to go to the extra effort of moving it only where you want it to print.

Jason
ProfQuotes

If the "smartphone" is PDA sized, it's too big to be a good cell phone, if it's cell phone sized, the screen is too small to use comfortable as a PDA. It can't be the right size to do both well.

How do you use the PDA when the screen is pressed into your cheek to talk? Or do you mean using a speaker phone so everyone within 50 feet hears both sides of your call instead of just you shouting into your PDA? Or maybe the headset which is even more to carry, more to buy, and more trouble to pull out of a pocket than a tiny cell phone.

Jason
ProfQuotes

If you didn't lose any phone fuctionality while using the PDA, why do they sell a carriage that holds your visorphone and lets you use it without the PDA?

If you lose both your PDA and cell phone at the same time, my arguements still stand; you don't need to upgrade both at once, and they're not likely to both break at once. I'd consider buying a visor prism for the colour screen, but there is no way I'd also pay for a new cell phone; my fairly new (and tiny) samsung clam-shell is just fine.

I don't know how you can hit the keys then. My fingers push at least 4 keys and once, and even when I try with my fingernails (which is a pain), my finger hits the key below the one I get with my nail.

The fact that you say there's so many features beyond my deluxe but don't mention any makes your statements weak (the newer OS version, more memory, faster CPU don't count because that's just enhancing the PDA and we already know the visor is 3 year old technoly, so of course any new PDA would up the specs. The products you're talking about aren't just upgraded PDAs; if they were, I'd have no problem with them.

Jason
ProfQuotes

90% of commercials are so annoying the prevent me from buying a product. There are products I haven't bought for years because of annoying commercials. 8% of commercials have no impact on my buying habits, and then there's the last 2% which I like and increase the chances I will buy the product.

If monitoring which commercials people skip causes companies to produce better and more entertaining ads, I'm all for it.

Jason
ProfQuotes

I think it's option C, getting smart about what is greatest. These "communicators" do a half-assed job as a PDA and as phone.

You can't use the PDA while on the phone, it's a lot bigger than a modern cell phone, costs more than both devices, makes it difficult to upgrade because then you lose you phone and PDA and have to replace both and lose all your accessories for both, same thing if it breaks. In the specific case of the treos they have a thumb keyboard which is useless for any adult male with normal-size hands.

There is no way I'd replace my Visor Deluxe with one of these pieces of crap even if they offered a straight trade. If it broke, I'd buy a used Visor Prism.

Jason
ProfQuotes

Include a notice on the page that prohibits harvesters from using your page, then sue them for license violations.

Jason
ProfQuotes

It might make politians think twice next time.

It would be nice if they'd think once.

Jason
ProfQuotes

Then I guess you don't drive because cars threw aside the horse based economy and changed a way of living. It put a lot of people out of work; blacksmiths, horse breaders and trainers, feed providers, etc.

You also don't eat then. On a modern farm, a single farmer can produce as much food as 100 farmers 200 years ago. That means 99% of the population who would have been farmers 200 years ago is doing other things today, such as programming computers, flying airplanes, and doing hundreds of other things they prefer to farming.

The only abomintation is stagnation. Human progress has been going on for hundreds of thousands of years. Would you prefer to still be living in caves and die of old age by the time you're 20?

That being said, I don't believe a machine can replace a human umpire. Even if the machine makes every call perfectly, the players and fans will not accept the calls against them. There's nobody to argue with and it's against human nature to accept a machine making judgements about them. I let some friends play chess on my computerized board once (they just wanted a normal chess board, but that was all I had), they let the computer referee their game. Eventually they got into a situation where one of them was in check, but neither saw it, so the computer wouldn't let the player make the move he wanted to. Their solution was to turn off the computer and make the move anyway.

Jason
ProfQuotes

You *will* be screwed by this ruling, regardless of where you live. Prices for various electronics will be going up

Even up here in Canada?

This might lower prices as the electronics companies try to unload their excess inventories that were aimed at the US.

Jason
ProfQuotes

This is the same sort of marketing that AMD uses with their XP processor speeds. I was watching the computer hour on the home shopping network a few weeks ago (it's funnier than any comedy show), and they were selling an XP 2000+. The sales snake kept emphasizing the "plus" which means it's better than just a normal 2GHz machine.

We, as consumers, allow AMD to get away with deliberately confusing marketing, so why should we be surprised when other organizations do the same thing? My current system is my first Intel since my 286 because I couldn't stand the though of buying into AMD's scheme.

Jason
ProfQuotes

That sounds like a good place to look. I'm assuming I can rent a dewar as the poster above you suggested. There's a lot of places at the local fish market that sell dry ice, but LN2 is a lot more fun.

At school a couple of the buildings had huge tanks of it (used for cooling the NMR machines) so I could get as much as I wanted for free. It's just since I graduated a few years ago that I haven't had access. Do you have any idea how long it will keep in a styrofoam cooler? That's what I used in school but I never kept it for more than an hour anyway.

I never did try the ice cream; if I can get some LN2, that's third on my list (after swirling my hand in it and throwing handfuls across the floor to race it for distance).

Jason
ProfQuotes

...but where can I get some liquid nitrogen?

Jason
ProfQuotes

I don't know about the rest of Canada, but in Ontario, the provincial government modified the Employment Standards Act in 2001 to explicitly make this kind of exploitation legal for IT workers and several other categories.

Jason
ProfQuotes

don't you mean
void main() {for(;;)fork();}?

Jason
ProfQuotes

Hey, my chainsaw has teeth...oh wait...damn, I have to get a new chain.

Jason
ProfQuotes

While we're at it, the courts should declare SCO a generic term for "silly lawsuit"

Jason
ProfQuotes

That wouldn't hold back many geeks at the sight of a female geek.

Jason
ProfQuotes

My real-time prof said that for space ship and car engine code, a good programmer can do an average of about 3 assembly instructions per day.

Jason
ProfQuotes

Rubik's makes a special cube for "less intelligent puzzlers". You might want to pick up one of these.

Jason
ProfQuotes

The software is just a 2 dimensional representation. I find it almost impossible to solve the normal cube in the software version and I can solve a physical cube in under 5 minutes. A 4D cube might be interesting but not a 2D representation of one. I like the 4x4x4 and 5x5x5 cubes at rubiks.com.

Jason
ProfQuotes

If you can't remember to charge batteries, it's your problem. I don't see how you can remember to charge the PDA but not batteries.

Jason
ProfQuotes

Handspring Visor deluxe. Except for a color display and slightly newer version of palmOS, there's still no PDA I'd rather have.

How much did your spare battery cost? As I said, my two sets were $10. That way I always have one charging and one in the Palm. I also use the alkalines that came with for when the ones in it die. After over a year, they're still more than 90% full.

Charging the palm from the cradle is useless because I don't leave my computer on when I'm not using it. The power adapter is almost as bad...It's yet one more thing that ties up an outlet. I have 3 power bars in here already and no free outlets. I also have lots of other devices that take standard batteries; minidisc player, digital camera, gameboy, etc. So I don't even have to think about charging proprietary batteries specifically for the PDA.

The only thing I have a non-standard battery for is my cell phone, and that's the only thing that consistantly lets me down with a dead battery. I will not pay $90 for a battery for a phone that was $110 with a battery; especially when 5 AAA's would cost $12.50 have the same capacity (and fit in the same space).

Jason
ProfQuotes

Batteries come in standard sizes like AA and D. They're designed to plug into any device. It's just these cell phone and notebook computer that want to rip off their customers by forcing them to buy proprietary sizes. My main criteria in picking my PDA was one that took ordinary batteries; not the internal rechargables that some have. I got 2 sets NiMH batteries for it for $10 and that's been a lot more useful than having to charge the PDA in a proprietary cradle.

Jason
ProfQuotes

I got to play with a Raytheon RF ID tracker on one of my co-op work terms. It is just a single antenna that you can can hide pretty much anywhere (as long as it's not in an RF shielded box or something), and the range can be anywhere from a few inches to 50 feet. The one I used was intended to track vehicles as they drive along an expressway.

Jason
ProfQuotes

With current technology? It doesn't take a battery, the power comes from the RF field generated by the reader.

It would be useless for inventory tracking if all your 6 month old inventory just disappeared off your inventory system.

If you think Wal-Mart clothing doesn't last 6 months, then you have a different problem

Jason
ProfQuotes

Yes, but when you go back to walmart 6 months later wearing what you bought there before, they'll know who you are (if you bought it on your credit card), and they'll know exactly where you go throughout the store and how long you spend in each location.

What's to stop other businesses from tracking their customers using the tags from other stores too. It's just an arbitrary number stored on the card.

Jason
ProfQuotes

It's 3 stories tall over an area the size of 4 tennis courts. When you fit that much computing power into a notebook, let me know.

Jason
ProfQuotes

Then there would be nothing to report.

Jason
ProfQuotes

Real property. Personally, I don't see any reason to have it. It ties you down geographically; you have to spend your own time maintaining it; and it saddles you with monstrous debt. I prefer to rent, myself

What happens when your landlord decides he wants to double your rent, or throw you out so his friend's son can live there? If you own the property, that can't happen. At the very least, real estate always goes up in value over the long term. If you buy now, then in 10 years your property is worth more so you've profited just by living there. If you rent, then in 10 years, you've helped your landlord afford to pay the mortgage on property that is now worth more for him...and he thanks you by raising the rent because the property is worth more.

Besides, getting it "for the kids" isn't especially realistic. Most people I know who have lost their parents sold the house as soon as the bodies were in the ground. Cut out the middle man and give them the money directly (preferably while you're still around, so you can share in whatever they spend it on).

The point is not to deprive myself of the use of what I work for, it's so that I can use it and it will still be left for my kids. With real estate, they'll have almost as much left as if I'd put the money in a CD, but I'll have been able to enjoy it my whole life. If they want to sell it for the money, that's fine with me; I want it to benefit them, not tie them down. I also expect to live long enough that they'll own homes of their own so they won't need mine anyway, but the money could help them with their mortgages. When I move out of my condo, I don't even plan to sell it, I'll rent it out and use the rent money to pay down the mortgage on my new home; in 20 years, the condo will have paid for itself so it will be like I got to keep it for free, and it will be worth a lot more than it is now.

Jason
ProfQuotes I thought

Well said. Don't forget to add that if I can't pass my real property to my children, then where is my incentive to work for it in the first place? Why should I work for my whole life to accumulate real assets if I have nothing to show for it? I will just choose to live off of welfare because in the end, the result of my life is the same, but I can enjoy it more without having to work.

A lot of people will have that attitude; enough so that the few who still work won't be able to support everyone, and the whole system will come crashing down.

Jason
ProfQuotes

The original Palms and the ones with roman numeral numbers were nice looking. The M-series and now the tungsten ones are ugly. I agree palm needs to put a lot more effort into the look of their handhelds. So does Handspring; Treo is a huge step down from Visor.

Jason
ProfQuotes

Stealing someone's in game assets is not the same as stealing something in the real world. It is just computer cracking and there's already laws to prosecute it.

Jason
ProfQuotes

'DDDDF' sounds like a report card.

Jason
ProfQuotes

Is it still a viable option to buy a ReplayTV? I thought they were in receivership right now, and if they do shut down, the ReplayTV boxes are useless because there will be no service.

Jason
ProfQuotes

MS isn't taking the hint because their customers haven't complained, people seem willing to accept a lot more from MS.

Jason
ProfQuotes

If they sell below their cost to produce to hurt their competition, that is dumping. If they bring down their production costs, then they are competing.

Jason
ProfQuotes

Most companies have no morals that's a given, but as I stated in my post, this is illegal, not just immoral.

Jason
ProfQuotes

Selling a product below cost or giving it away for free to make it difficult for competitors to get a foothold is called dumping, and it violates anti-trust laws.

This is exactly why Standard Oil and AT&T were split up.

When you say a company should do anything within their power to make their software as widespread as possible, do you include illegal things? Maybe a campaign of assassinating prominant open source developers until nobody is willing to work on Linux.

Jason
ProfQuotes

The problem with that is that it's Sony, and they make the rest of the RIAA and MS look pro-fair use.

I'm very tempted to a MZ-NE410 minidisc player. It's $120 at costco with an extra 5-pack of media, which is incredibly cheap. The only thing in the "con" column is that it's Sony, so there are silly DRM features that ruin it.

Jason
ProfQuotes

Is anybody else tired of having multiple (completely identical feature wise) discs to choose from? Is this not lunacy?

I'm still waiting for there to one standard for DVD?R before I buy. It sounds like by the time there is a single standard for the 4.7G discs, it will be a moot point anyway because I'll just switch to waiting for a 36G standard.

Jason
ProfQuotes

Apparently it has to be 'a specific set of operations in a specific sequence with specific data.

This sounds similar to the way they described the floating point divide error in the original pentium. How long until they start giving odds on the chances of someone seeing the problem in normal use.

Jason
ProfQuotes

Typecasting is a tool -- do you really trust the compiler to recognize exactly what you mean in every scenario, throughout your hundereds of thousands of lines of code?

A technique I frequenly use in C++ is to typecast an object to a string, then pass the string across a communications channel (like TCP/IP), and then typecast it back to an object. You can't do that in a strongly typecast language, so you have to do a lot more work.

It's a tool that you're forced to use, even for the wrong job. It's like being forced to use a hammer to install screws.

Jason
ProfQuotes

He just mirrored the image.

Jason
ProfQuotes

I can only play for 10 hours/week because I have to spend 40 making money so I can pay for the service. They can't cater exclusively to people who get mommy to pay for them can they?

Jason
ProfQuotes

AOL did not lose $99 billion by distributing their CDs. In fact they did not lose a cent.

In 1999, AOL had a larger market capitalization than GM and Ford combined. When they merged with Time Warner, the AOL division was on the books of the combined company as having that large value. When the dotcom bubble burst, the market value of AOL plunged. The $99 billion was a write-down of the value of the AOL division as the stocks dropped. Their core operations are still making money, and they can't be blamed for how stupid their investors are in bidding them up during the boom.

Jason
ProfQuotes

Historically, there's been no signup fee, only monthly fees.

My first internet account in 1993 charged a sign-up fee, and then when I switched to high-speed in 1997, there was an other sign-up fee. It's only more recently that customers have smartened up and will refuse to pay it. It's too bad they're still making the same stupid mistake again. I will never pay another activation fee. I don't have a land-line because my phone company does have a fee. They also offer satellite TV, high-speed internet, and cellular phone service, all three of which I get from other companies because this one changes an activation fee on their land lines. In all, I spend over $150/month with other companies that I would spend with the phone company if they didn't have the one-shot $50 activation fee, I have also talked dozens of people into going with their competition.

EQ is not interchangeable with DAOC, Star Wars Galaxies, or The Sims Online.

You're wrong here too, it may not be the exact same service, but it fills the same market. These games are in direct competition with each other. If someone signs up with Sims Online, it drastically decreases their chances of signing up with EverQuest. People only have so many hours a week to play the games, and only want to incur so many of the monthly fees. If EQ offers a better deal, they will steal business from SWG, even if the player would prefer SWG.

That's exactly the same mistake Polariod made and that's why polariod is in receivership right now. They thought they were in the "self-developing picture" market and had a monopoly, but in reality they are in the "instant picture" market and are competing with digital cameras.

If someone has to pay $50 for the MMO, they are taking a big risk that they might hate the game. If they just have to pay the $10 fee for the first month, a lot of people who would never consider risking the $50 will try the game, and a lot will decide they like it and keep playing (and paying).

If the game was free, how do the customers get it?

I answered this earlier. Sell the for the price of the first month of service and include the first month free. They will probably break even on the discs, and then have to eat the first month of service, but they will make up for it many times over in more customers.

Surely they must have thought of this model as well; perhaps there's some good reasons why they don't use it.

Surely the book publishers must realize that a lof of people enjoy reading on their PDAs, and that is a great opportunity.
Surely the RIAA must realize that people like having their entire music library on their computer so they don't have to deal with swapping discs, so copy protection is a bad thing and electronic distribution is good.

300,000 copies at a more realistic $50, 20% of which might go to the developer

So you're saying that the developer only gets the value of the one month of service out of the game anyway and the rest is lost in the distribution channel. That means the publisher doesn't even get any benefit from charging the customers but they've introduced a huge dis-incentive to potential customers.

Jason
ProfQuotes