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Slashback: Squashing, N'Synch, Yopy
Waitaminute, what happens there between the "lead" stage and the "gold" stage again? HomerSimpson writes: "Recently on /. I read of a compression scheme reported to provide huge gains for the compression of random data. New Scientist reports, however, that the claims are unlikely at best."
Perhaps we can watch some other bands be slaughtered instead? eruditorium writes: "Apparently, the negative public reaction to n'sync's appearence in episode 2 has caused lucas to drop their cameo. See it here on Scifi Wire." san1701 links to another similar posting about this important issue at TheForce.Net.
On-again, off-again is not good for electronic projects. cd_Csc writes: "CNET is reporting on Samsung's newest Windows CE based PDA and mentioned (as a side note) that, 'A Samsung representative also confirmed the cancellation of Yopy, the company's planned Linux-based PDA.'"
Update: 01/11 02:41 GMT by T : Looks like it's not quite that simple: Bill Kendrick writes "LinuxDevices.com caught wind of today's Slashback regarding the Yopy PDA's demise.
Well, fortunately for Yopy fans, they got the real scoop directly from G.Mate..." Thanks for the quick response, Bill, and sorry for spreading false information.
Imagine explaining to your kids what VCRs were. jimmcq writes: "Slashdot previously ran a story asking about Hacking the New Replay TV Units. There have been several recent breakthroughs to allow a PC to emulate a Replay 4000 so that video can be shared in both directions. The source code has been released under the GPL. There are also several variations including a java version and an Apache/PHP Server."
Sourceforge, part of VA Software, disables downloads from Simply GNUstep, a project they host....
...after Slashdot, another part of VA Software, posts a story about it.
Way to support the community, guys.
Dragging people kicking and screaming into reality since 1996.
The Yopy was Dropped by Samsung, but was re-designed by g.mate the comapny that was in cortrol of the unit all along. It's got just about the same specs as most of the pda's coming out now, but with and odd keyboard layout. check out or Personally I'll be getting the Zaurus shortly, and from what I've seen this is the Linux PDA to get.
Ubuntu- Linux for human beings.
The problem with the millions of half-thought out compression ideas is exactly that: They're half thought out. It's easy to think "Well I'll just search for sequences in pi because pi is infinitely long and if you had an infinite number of monkeys....". It all comes down to entropy or the variability in a particular bit space (yup I yabbled about this in another post), and the simple cold hard reality is that 1 byte can represent no more than 256 different "realities", versus 2 bytes which can hold 65536 different values : 2 bytes cannot POSSIBLY represent every combination of values that could be contained by even 3 bytes (which has 16777216 different combinations): There is no trick or slight of hand to get around this basic mathematical fact.
That basic fact immediately discounts and proves impossible any compressibility of random data, absolutely and non-refutably. Imagine up ways to store floating point numbers, or to "3d encapsulate the space-time continuum", but it all comes down to entropy, and the limitation of it when trying to represent X amount of data in
... probably still in there.
theforce.net : Bye, Bye, Bye 'NSync? Not So Fast
- sigs are for wimps.
I hate N'sync not because of jealousy, not because I dislike their music and not because I dislike them.
I hate them because they are a symbol of modern pop culture, the marketing machine that calculates what you should think and then creates it. I hate that the fans, my fellow Americans, who are completely ignorant to the fact that they were atrifically created, a T-1000 of the year 2000, a puppet, a robot to suck money out of the pockets of young teen's parents and to sway the fragile and youthful minds into a 'market share'.
I hate the fact that they are the drug of the industrailist machine that keeps its workers happy and ignorant, a 'soma' in this Brave New World.
I hate the fact that they are the icons of conformist pop culture, a culture that spits on any other ideas, a culture that breeds ignorance and a culture that so typifies America.
"N'Sync" is the marketing term for this. It is the name of the symbol. It is a buzz word more then a band, the shwastika of music industry.
The people in the band are probably cool kids and they got the shaft as soon as they signed up for the band. Their lives are probably controlled by "image" and "popularity" however that was the deal with the devil that they accepted when they willfully signed.
If my burger sucks I'll complain to the waitress. She didn't make the burger, 'I shouldn't take it out on her' but if I put pressure on her to make a better burger, she'll go to the cook and proxy the pressure. I don't have access to the cook.
I hate pop culture because I hate mass ignorance and I hate the pressure that so many teen agers go through to 'conform' with twig-thin bodies, cool clothes and the perfect attitude. I state my disdain with this to the waitress of pop culture, "N'Sync" so that the back-line cooks, the marketing gurus of pop culture may hear it through proxy.