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Palm Tungsten Models Reviewed
Jason Weill writes "MSNBC has a slightly premature review of Palm's brand-new Tungsten models. These models, currently (as of 11:10 PM EST Sunday) unavailable on Palm's own web site, are the Tungsten T and Tungsten W. The Tungsten T includes a fold-out Graffiti area, new cross-key keypad, 144 MHz ARM processor, Palm OS 5, a 320x320 full-color screen, and 16 MB of on-board RAM. At $499, it's more expensive than most handhelds currently on the market. The Tungsten W replaces the Graffiti area with a thumb keyboard and includes GSM/GPRS phone capabilities. Unlike the Handspring Treo devices, the Tungsten W only works with a handset -- you can't put it up to your ear. The Tungsten W will cost $549, although most American service providers will subsidize at least part of the cost. These models will officially be unveiled Monday, October 28."
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So you're new to Slashdot, you've just posted your first comment and, within seconds, it got moderated down. Don't worry, it's happened to all of us. The first thing to do is calm down and don't take it personally. You know and I know that your comment was wonderful. The second thing to do it realise that moderation points are handed out at random and, therefore, chances are that the person that moderated your comment wasn't really qualified to.
... it's just one of those Slashdot paradoxes one has to learn to live with.
What follows is a guide to the negative moderations available to moderators, how moderators use them, and how to avoid them in the future.
-1 Flamebait.
Traditionally a 'flamebait' was a post that attracted angry responses. However, on Slashdot a post if flamebait if it angers the moderator. Most comments that get moderated flamebait *never* receive a single flame in reply
A comment may anger a moderator for many reasons, but the most likely is that you mentioned an operating system that the moderator doesn't approve of.
This is a hard situation to avoid; moderators come from all walks of life and use a range of operating systems - all the way from "Microsoft Windows '95" all the way up to "Microsoft Windows XP Home Edition.".
The solution is to keep your post vague when it comes to revealing details of the systems that you own and use. So even if your comment hinges on the fact that such-and-such is relevant to, for example, Windows 2000; mentioning this will inflame a large portion of the moderators. Using phrases such as "my computer" and "my systems" will keep you safe in the eyes of OS zealots.
-1 Offtopic
Since the minority of readers actually read the article, let alone any pages that the article may link to; the actual topic of the discussion is usually very vague. The topic is actually defined by the first few posts made to the discussions. To avoid the -1 offtopic moderation, sort by score and follow the lead set by the highest rated comment.
Another way to receive a -1 offtopic is to reply to a point made in someone else's comment. Since this person's point probably wasn't made in the article itself (the article is usually very short and vague) then your reply is bound to be offtopic!
You are probably asking yourself; "Surely that the post I replied to is offtopic as well then?". Yes, it is. However moderators tend to moderate the
'leaves' of the discussion before moderating the 'root' level comments. Although the later is far more efficient in tidying up a discussion, it only really punishes the poster of that comment. It is better to work up and punish everyone in the thread because, frankly, sometimes it is deserved.
-1 Redundant
Using a strict definition, a comment would redundant if it repeated something from the article or an earlier comment. Since moderators read neither of these, the -1 redundant moderation is very rarely used.
You are most likely to receive it if you post something informative and well known early in the discussion. This attracts the -1 redundant moderation for two reasons
i) If the moderator already knows the information that you are presenting then your comment is, obviously, redundant.
ii) Since it is well known, another poster may post something similar after you. In an ideal world, the later comment should be moderated redundant; however most moderators do not know how Slashdot is sorting the comments, therefore the -1 redundant moderation will fall with 50% probability on either of the two comments.
-1 Troll
In the pre-Slashdot days, a Troll was a post or comment designed to attract many responses. In contrast, users who troll other Slashdot users usually do so with well-known in-jokes. It won't take long for you to recognise these and learn what to avoid; but in general a post mentioning the author Steven King, the actress Natalie Portman or the Linux clustering system Beowulf will attract an instant -1 Troll moderation regardless of whether it was one of the proscribed comments or not.
-1 Troll is also used when the moderator suspects a comment of being offtopic, redundant or flamebait but isn't yet a good enough moderator to be sure.
The -1 Troll moderation is one of the worst things that can happen to an innocent new Slashdot user; moderators loathe what they think of a trolls and once a comment receives one -1 Troll moderation any other moderator which sees it will instantly add another -1 Troll moderation. A +5 informative can be reduced to -1 troll in seconds once the first moderation is made; this happens whether the initial -1 Troll moderation was fair or not - the instinct to use the -1 Troll moderation is almost pavlovian.
-1 Overrated
-1 overrated moderations are not subject to Slashdot's meta-moderation scheme. This fact is not widely known amongst the moderators; they don't have time to learn the details and rules of the system - the need to moderate your comment down is more important. The few moderators that do know this will therefore always moderate -1 overrated because it protects them from the meta-moderation system. A -1 overrated moderation doesn't mean your post is overrated, indeed most -1 overrated moderations are applied to comments that have not even been rated - another of Slashdot's intractable paradoxes. The
rest of the -1 overrated moderations are applied to excellent comments that have reached the heady heights of Score 5; the motivation for the moderation is pure jealousy.
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You just changed my mind... I'm going to get a nice cell phone now instead of a Tungsten.
"but at least we got that right"
No, you didn't. One standard is great, but in the long run competing standards are more benificial. Look at CDMA - there are several healthy CDMA carriers in the US (Sprint, Verizion, etc.), and there are several TDMA/GSM carriers (ATT, T-Mobile). No, you can't use any phone on any service. No, that doesn't matter - phones are pretty much free over here. Some carriers do lock SIM cards, but most carriers don't even use them. I don't know about prices in Europe but I do know that they are falling like plutonium bricks over here. You can choose how you want your cellular too, unlimited local usage for $32/month (Cricket), pre-pay (ATT, Virgin Mobile, Others), free nights/weekends (several carriers), lots of "anytime" minutes (several carriers), no roaming/long distance (Sprint, ATT, others), mobile internet (Verizion, Sprint, AT&T, others), SMS (almost all carriers), etc.
OK, it's nice to have one standard for a whole continent. But, when comparing size and population, the US is pretty much the same as Western Europe. Everytime someone brags about having universal service throughout Europe, I respond with the fact that our service is pretty universal also. Coverage is pretty good, no matter what carrier you use. OK, so you can't use your AT&T phone if you want to switch to Verizion. Big deal, Verizion is perfectly happy to give you a free or nearly free phone.
Cellular service is different here. We are not Europe, and we do not try to be Europe. For better or worse, the government pretty much keeps it's hands out of things (although that is slowly changing). Instead of forcing one communication standard, the government has let the market decide. Ultimately, CDMA will probably win. Europe is stuck with TDMA GSM service. Why is CDMA better? Mostly because it can handle two to three times more calls per channel. CDMA is a better technology; even the European carriers recognize this (and are rushing to change their networks). I am not sure about costs today, but in the long run mobile phone service in the US will be cheaper than it is in Europe. It happened here with long distance (remember 25 cents a minute?), and it will happen with cellular service. Switching to CDMA is not hard in the US because we never had a standard. Sprint was CDMA from the start. No standard = best technology wins. Unfortunately, no standard = chaos. Until a few years ago, US cellular service was a joke - mostly analog service, with terrible digital coverage. Europe laughed, with good reason - our system sucked. Then CDMA came out, and carriers began to use it. CDMA put the heat on, and carriers responded with digital TDMA that didn't stink. The cellular systems in this country became digital almost overnight.
So, no, I can't take my SIM out and use my phone with a different carrier. But there are really only two GSM carriers, and GSM is not the wireless standard in the US. There really is no standard over here, which is a mixed blessing. Ultimately, however, the customer will win. TDMA is going to go away in the US; even AT&T will eventually migrate their network to CDMA.
I wouldn't have it any other way.
Now to undo the positive moderations... Just wanted to waste mod points.
When will Palm learn their lesson and put a decent CPU in their handhelds? PocketPC machines have had 266mhz ARM procs for ages, and recently upgraded to the 400Mhz XScale processor...