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Slashback: Reconciliation, Passportation, Inflation
Reconciliation among comics and gnomes. CaptainCarrot writes: "In today's Penny Arcade newspost, Tycho continues the discussion on Scott McCloud's piece on micropayments. He has moderated his tone considerably from his original rant on the subject, and offered his apologies for, as he puts it, having misjudged McCloud. During their phone conversations, the two apparently came to some meeting of the minds. Here's yesterdays Slashback on the topic, and the two prior relevant discussions."
On a similar note, in response to the recent story on Gnome losing its 2.0 package maintainer, an Anonymous Coward wrote:"Here's the first chapter in the rest of the story. In short, the guy who quit, returned."
Perhaps they'll be offering student visas. Mike Schiraldi writes: "MSDN users aren't the only ones who have to use Passport. When i bought a Dell computer this January, it came with a "free" (i.e. included in the price of the machine) year of MSN. I went to set up POP, and found out that MSN no longer supports POP for new subscribers. We have to use a secret Passport protocol that only the new Outlook Express can speak. I fought with customer service, and spoke with many levels of tech support, and believe me, they're not budging."
Is this because a Real Doll would be too heavy? Hanford writes: "Looks like this checklist for a simulated Mars mission includes a few comforts from Earth. Check out the last two items. Remember this is from nasa.gov :)"
And since you won't be on camera nearly as much as the astronauts in the various earth-orbiting devices are, this might be more practical than aloft. Remember those vinyl patches, too.
... and the real story is this:
We have 3 kinds of MSN:
1. Just plain old MSN
2. DellNet by MSN
3. Compaq.net by MSN
Every user of any of them starts off with a POP3 email account, MSN version 5.4 and lower uses POP3, MSN version 6.0 and higher (MSN Explorer, which DellNet users get installed on the system) will convert the POP3 account to web based (hotmail basically) if the user logs into his account through the software.
ALL web based email accounts CAN BE ROLLED BACK TO POP3 but ONLY over the phone by technical support, however, we are *not allowed* to do it for anyone who has never used 5.4 or an earlier version of the software.
This is how you get your account rolled back:
Call up tech support, tell them you were using 5.0 of the software and were using pop3 email but installed the MSN Explorer and didn't like it. Say you want to go back to pop3 and you saw, (these are the magic words right here) on support services, that if you called they can roll it back, if they ask you if you have DellNet by MSN say *no* and they will roll it back to pop3.
So get a yahoomail account. Or hotmail.
10 PRINT CHR$(205.5+RND(1)); : GOTO 10
I was at apachecon in march and Greig Stein (author of mod_dav for apache) said that Microsoft is actually using the web dav protocal in place of SMTP and POP in Outlook express for Hotmail.
Maybe MSN is moving to this style of accessing mail. I guess by using dav on the servers the can handle alot more users easier.
He also said that a MS dude even posted what URL to use to fetch the mail on the mod_dav list. I thought it was pretty cool to see that MS was actaully using open protocals, albeit in a weird way (=
ten packs of chewing gum
one revolver
four nylons
one standard issue prophelactic
A fella' could have a good time on Mars with all this stuff!
JET Program: see Japan, meet intere
Many free OS users don't want to build their own system. I used to build boxen myself, but now I simply don't have the time for it.
I like being able to give someone my credit card number and get an assembled, configured machine in return. I save money that way, because my time is money. Even more important, when something breaks, I call the vendor and they fix it. I save even more money that way.
Too bad VA is leaving the hardware business. I'll have to go with Dell or IBM or one of those other vendors that "sort of" supports linux, on some of their machines.
I've built my share of PCs from parts, but I realize that a reputable pre-built machine has value added in the engineering and testing performed by the manufacturer. I don't have to worry about whether the components are compatible with each other and the operating system. There is a single point-of-contact for maintenance, technical support, software/firmware updates and parts.
Mea navis aericumbens anguillis abundat
However, MSN hasn't made their isp business based on the "closed circuit" model, previously supporting (and still supporting for old customers) the standard: pop. The fact that they are moving *away* from an open standard to a closed one, and that they are one of the largest isps, is definite and legitimate cause for concern and/or outcry. OTOH, if they had started out "AOL-like", this *wouldn't* have even made it to a slashback, because it wouldn't be news.
HTH,
Fetchmail is essential, but its existence doesn't mean the deal isn't a con, unless they are PAYING to support fetchmail's development and offering it as a solution for accessing their mail server.
Boss of nothin. Big deal.
Son, go get daddy's hard plastic eyes.
Expanding a vast wasteland since 1996.
If they had ever seen the Ugly Kid Joe video "(I Hate) Everything about You", they would know that you can use a blow up doll as a kite. Leave the kite behind and make room for those 2 liters of alcohol!
---- El diablo esta en mis pantalones! Mire, mire!
We shouldnt be sending people who'll need their booze and blowup dolls by any means.
If you had ever met any Marines or oil rig miners you would know that those two sentences are self-contradictory.
---- El diablo esta en mis pantalones! Mire, mire!
If you don't like the service ... then don't use their service.
I agree. However, you missed the point. The whole reason he's miffed is that he paid for something and didn't get what he expected. Whether his expectations were created by actual advertisement or were his own idea is not presented here.
Either way, he bought a Windows PC that came with a bundle of crudware. He should have expected to pay for something he didn't want.
--
SecretAsianMan (54.5% Slashdot pure)
Washington, DC: It's like Hollywood for ugly people.
Once again, Microsoft wants to do services that only work with Microsoft software. POP is simple and efficient. If they wanted to increase security, they could just have upgraded to APOP or Imap. Almost all clients support these protocols.
But they are somewhat shooting themselves in the foot. Not every Windows users wants (or is able) to upgrade Outlook. I guess their hotline will get a lot of calls, and they may go back to some standard protocol then.
-- Pure FTP server - Upgrade your FTP server to something simple and secure.
{{.sig}}
Its not that complicated folks
It's simplistic, even!
- - - - -
Napster-to-go says "Fill and refill your compatible MP3 player", which is a lie. It's not MP3. It's WMA with DRM.
From WHERE exactly can I buy those machines please ?
Check out the Dell Poweredge 300SC. I just bought one (they were $100 cheaper last month) and I am really happy with it. All told, including tax, shipping, and one gig of RAM from Crucial, I spent $1120 for a P3/800, 40G IDE disk, and that sleek black case that I can I completely take apart without a screwdriver.
And there's no Microsoft tax.
--
My word processor was written by Stanford Professor Donald Knuth. Who wrote yours?
>Reasonable (and legal!) quantities of food items may be brought along for personal use or sharing.
I'm just wondering one thing here: Could I bring some space-cake(both for personal use and for sharing)? it's illegal in the US... but not everywhere. And I guess getting the munchies is a big nono on a mission to mars
//rdj
No one can understand the truth until he drinks of coffee's frothy goodness.
--Sheikh Abd-Al-Kadir, 1587
I've bought (the parts for) my last two machines at Computer Renassance (that's compren.com for the url/spelling challenged). I put together the hardware I wanted at the price I wanted to pay, and didn't buy any software I didn't want.
I have no connection with them except as a satisfied customer.
--
150 Opening BINARY mode data connection for slashdot.sig (129323052 bytes).
> ... server-class machine (available for under $1000) ... saving $800 ...
From WHERE exactly can I buy those machines please ? I'd like to get - like - a dozen of those server-class machines with no O/S on them. Today. Now. While supplies last.
--
1% APY, No fees, Online Bank https://captl1.co/2uIErYq Don't let your $$$ sit in a no-interest acct.
I think a more accurate analogy would be:
If your computer came with (i.e. you paid for) a year's supply of dog food, but they waited for your check to clear and then told you that you have to take their dog that shits on your rug in order to get the food, would you expect any recourse?
I would.
-Peter
Remember this is from nasa.gov
:-)
Not *just* NASA. It's on a gov't site, but the other project involved is FMARS, which is private. It isn't all tax dollars at work, so I suppose that justifies the departure from the usual NASA drollness. Non-profits can't afford not to have a sense of humor.
I think what's interesting are the shotgun classes.
FMARS is the Flashline Mars Analog Research Station, which is a project of The Mars Society (Flashline is the name sponsor for the mission). It is a simulated Mars base. There is an article about it in the print version of this month's Scientific American.
This is one of The Mars Society's projects for establishing a human presence on Mars. There will be a series of these simulated bases placed in analogous Mars environments throughout the world. The first is on Devon Island in the Canadian Arctic. The next will be placed in the American Southwest. Currently it is on exhibit at the Kennedy Space Center Visitors' Center. It will begin its field season this September in the desert.
Additionally, The Mars Society has a prototype pressurized Mars rover program. It also has a trust fund established to raise money for a privately funded mission to establish a permanent presence on Mars. It may take a century or two of saving, but The Mars Society will *do* it.
If you want to do Linux or any other non-monopoly OS, you'll want to build yourself. Yes yes, I know, you don't want to learn how to build a computer. So get your geekly friend to do it for you. Many of them are happy to do it for just the cost of the hardware because it gives them a chance to show off. If you really dig it, get them to teach you how to go about it. It isn't that hard and once you've lost your fear that you'll destroy your expensive hardware, you've conquered the hardest part.
Don't have a geekly friend? Come on! You read Slashdot! Don't lie to me, now...
I'm trying to teach myself to set people on fire with my mind... Is it hot in here?
I'll grant you, it's a lot harder. I've been wanting to build a wearable for a while now but I've been waiting for the HMD technology to improve a bit. If I need a laptop in the mean time, I believe I can get IBM to bundle Linux on one for me.
I'm trying to teach myself to set people on fire with my mind... Is it hot in here?
Reconciliation makes the news! :) I'm glad to see some good vibes going around.
A friend of mine got sick of our university's clunky email server, so he figured out (ok, reverse engineered) the HTTPMail protocol that Hotmail uses. He wrote a proxy server, initially in perl, and more recently in ruby, which allows you to point your mail client at your local machine and it will proxy requests to the HTTPmail server (i.e., Hotmail). It's OSS and hosted on SourceForge. Give it a try. It beats whining on /. about not being about to use POP3.
Sometimes they are acknowledging that other people own the territory now. You can try and stop us, if you want, they may imply, but you'll loose the war.
--
Free Software: Like love, it grows best when given away.
Which would be even more of a real disincentive if that expulsion involved an airlock, halfway to Mars. (Though expulsion above the Artic circle is no joke, either.)
--
"Ain't no right way to do a wrong thing."
And for the commercial... "Don't hate me because I'm beautiful... Hate me for ripping your heart out with a rusty spoon and spitting on it."
What, me bitter? Nah...
--Fesh
--Fesh
Kill -9 'em all, let root@localhost sort 'em out.
--Fesh
--Fesh
Kill -9 'em all, let root@localhost sort 'em out.
...then why do you care how you get your MSN mail anyway?
Just do the same thing I used to do with Lotus Notes at work--use it for the "required" company BS, use real mail to do real work.
If MSN sends you privacy notices, billing info, things like that, then you have to read your MSN e-mail, but you should be able to filter out everything that doesn't come from them and/or just check it once in a while to make sure you aren't being charged for scratching your butt. If you never give out your MSN address, then you know that everything else that comes there is spam.
Use real mail for everything else. Is it a PiTA? Yes, but what did you expect from a freebie given away with a box for promotional reasons?
For all intensive purposes, "whom" is no longer a word. That begs the question, "who cares"?
When I saw the department thingy under the headline, I immediately thought "Flash file extension" and not "single white female." Is this as bad as I imagine it to be?
Not in any way that matters...
/Brian
I do think Dell has some of the sexiest server cases out there...
Dell does seem to be pretty good about the commodity thing, apart from their obsessive reliance on Intel. I am inclined to agree though that you're better off going small-time or self-built sometimes.
/Brian
The thing about Sony's systems is that they're so proprietary that getting Linux on them is something of a challenge. It's a psychological thing -- by buying a LavenderPlasticBox and throwing Linux on it, some people probably feel that they're repudiating proprietary business models in their own way.
Me, personally... now that the PC subnotebook market has opened up again, I'd just as soon buy one from Gateway if I was going to. Theirs are just as slick and a lot less proprietary. (Though I'd go for the iBook first, just like you...)
The thing about laptops that surprises me -- how is it that we don't see partially-assembled systems with power circuits and such where all you need to do is add a motherboard and hard drive? (Or do we? I never see such things in Computer Shopper...) It would seem like a pretty obvious thing to do.
/Brian
Hmm. And to think, it was NASA that brought us such useful substances as teflon, which makes for easy-clean, non-stick surfaces...
Then again, if a RealDoll's too heavy, I'm sure they could get by with a RealHamster instead.
Should have read (might as well go all the way):
Funny, you think that on a real mission they'd want to conserve oxygen, not waste it on those dolls... (Robert Schimmel joke: "Inflatable love doll - she never has a headache! Yeah, but you do after blowing her up...) I wonder if they have NASA-approved sex toys...?
Help save the critically endangered Blue Iguana
The slashdot 2 minute between postings limit: /.'ers since Spring 2001.
Pissing off coffee drinking
1q2w3e4r5t6y7u8i9o0pqawsedrftgthyjukilo;p'azsxdcf
but if you can bring 2 liters of any alcohol, you might as well bring 2 liters on moonshine, a few packs of coolaid, some sugar and make "nuclear slurpies". That'll warm you up on a cold night...
The slashdot 2 minute between postings limit: /.'ers since Spring 2001.
Pissing off coffee drinking
1q2w3e4r5t6y7u8i9o0pqawsedrftgthyjukilo;p'azsxdcf
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If you don't like the service that Microsoft is offering--that is, if you want POP3 access and they won't give it to you--then don't use their service.
Sheesh, it's not like Microsoft already has a monopoly on email.
So you got a year's free access, and you feel you have to use it? If your computer came with a year's supply of dog food, would you eat it just because you don't have a dog?
b&
All but God can prove this sentence true.
"Personal GPS receiver 1 Recommended Camping
A strongly recommended item. Garmin and Magellan are among the more reliable brands. "Selective availability" is no longer a limitation. If you have a GPS receiver, be sure you know how to use it if navigating with it."
Somebody please explain how GPS would work on Mars? (i.e. without an existing network of orbiting satellites)
*** I am the real stylewagon
Literally ; )
No sig for you.
Dont send all that stuff to Mars with these people, folks..really.
We have two ways of developing Mars- tourist method and productive method. In the tourist method, the luxuries from Earth are imported to hermetically sealed hotels, and, like "ecotourists," those who are on Mars are enjoying it for its pristine nature.
The productive method is prefarable; through grueling work over centuries, Mars is terraformed to bring a less exotic but more profound benefit to all humanity.
We should be sending Marines there and oil rig miners- people who are used to very extreme conditions and will relish the hardship and use it as an incentive to change the red planet to something habitable for human life.
We shouldnt be sending people who'll need their booze and blowup dolls by any means.
Of course, a Spartan existence for Mars colonists may encourage a nascent nationalism among them- even a desire for eventual independence from Earth. That's why Earth will want them as dependent on luxuries as possible- to affect their deep politics and character.
Dont think their aren't sci fi hacks who couldnt get published sitting at CIA analyst desks right now thinking about this stuff.
Goat sex free since 2001
If I understand the MSN FAQ cited above, the proprietary protocol doesn't even support Outlook, just Outlook Express. (One difference between these is that Outlook stores your old emails on your own hard drive. Express stores them on the server only.)
They are going to somewhere in the Arctic, maybe Devon Island (Canadian, NW of Greenland if I remember right), where conditions are as Mars-like as possible without spaceflight. OK, the air is still breathable (except a sudden inhalation through the mouth could frost-bite your lungs), and the gravity is wrong, but temperature and terrain are similar, and we've got to train somehow before the real thing.
Big shock. Why should anyone care if Microsoft requires you to use their products when you use their ISP? Where are the articles about AOL requiring you to use their client software to get mail?
Look, there is plenty to get irritated about with Microsoft. They are very predatory with their licensing and the way they bully their partners. Wouldn't it make more sense to attack the things that are almost universally decried rather than attacking everything MS does and look "anti-microsoft"?
People shouldn't hate microsoft because of who they are but rather hate the specific things they do are wrong. It's counterproductive to seek out issues that will detract from the primary point that Microsoft uses licensing, bundling, and bullying to keep its suppliers in line and crush the competitors.
Again, this is no different than what AOL does.