I disagree. At a minimal level, what FOSS does is put pressure on the non-free products to become better. You gave the example of MS Office. You are correct that OpenOffice.org (arguabley) doesn't offer much more to the user other than just being FOSS (dont' forget it runs on Linux too). However, what it does do, is put pressure on MS to justify their high price tag. If you are going to charge me $300 for an office suite that I could otherwise get for free, it better be worth $300 more. It also puts the pressure on MS to bring the price down. Is Office really worth that much money? Considering there is a free alternative, no it's not. The extra features I will get for $300, is not worth $300 to me. Maybe to some, but not to me. That's for the consumer to decide. Just look at the latest version of Office. It's the most radically different version we've seen (for better or worse). This is a direct response to OpenOffice.org.
Firefox and IE7 are another example of this. IE didn't have any significant improvements until Firefox came along, and now IE is being very actively improved upon. It took five years to go from IE6 to IE7, yet now IE8 is already being developed. However, in this scenario, the FOSS product was actually a major improvement over the existing non-FOSS product. Many want all software to be FOSS. I'm still not completely sold on that. I think everyone should have the choice and sometimes it takes a well payed developer to get the job done because its hard to find someone to volunteer their time for a rather uninteresting (yet necessary) application. Right now, I think the two complement eachother. FOSS creates competition in areas that otherwise would be dominated by monopolies. FOSS makes applications available that would otherwise be too expensive for a single person or a small business to afford. This is quite empowering. Think about it for a minute. Thanks Apache or MySQL the singular person with modest budget can implement an enterprise class web server or database. The playing field has just been leveled.
You got it! Familiarity is the key. Maybe the web banner doesn't directly initiate the sale, but it does help create familiarity. Take one of Slashdot's banner ads for Baracuda networking equipment. Prior to being a Slashdotter, I was not aware of this company. But thanks to their ads on Slashdot, I know the exist and I know that they make routers, etc. Being just a Slashdot ad, I don't pay too much attention to it. However, I keep seeing ad posters in airports for this company. That catches my eye. Since so many web ads are just junk, you don't pay much attention them, but now I have "corroborating evidence" that this company is legit and at least are big enough to have a decent ad budget. Now I am certainly not in the market for a router, but if I were, prior to seeing these ads, I would not have even considered Baracuda. In fact, I would not have heard of them at all. Now that I have some familiarity, I would probably take the next step of researching the company and its products in more detail. This may or may not lead to a sale, but it certainly put me on the right track. As the commentary here today suggests, we don't really know much about how big a role various ads play, but at least Microsoft is making an effort to understand it. That's a benefit to all of us. For all we know, they could determine that web ads are completely useless and the industry of littering web pages with more ads than content may come to an end (finally!).
Once again, no one on/. understands what opportunity cost is. The parent is absolutely right and the grand parent has no accounting background.
Opportunity cost, in short, is the cost of NOT doing business. This means that Apple could be making $X IF every iPhone is registered by AT&T or any other cooperating carrier outside the US. This is not just fake number. This number is important for many reasons. Mainly, if we do X instead of Y, what revenue would Y have brought in, and is that more or less than if we do X. Or in more real world terms, should we use our extra profit on employee bonuses, or should we expand the company? If we were to expand the company, what is our potential revenue? If we instead go the bonuses route, then the potential revenue from expansion, is the opportunity cost. This helps you decide which route to take.
It is also important in industrial insurance policies. If a hurricane hits a factory in Puerto Rico, there is the physical loss (property damage, lost inventory, rebuilding) and then there is the opportunity cost of not being able to produce more of the product while rebuilding taking place. Instead of making X widgets, we can only make X-Y widgets, which means less revenue. This is factored into the insurance payout in the event of a such an occurance.
Similarly, Apple has produced 1.4 million iPhones that will not be registered(thus preventing the registration revenue). It was Apples intent to have these phones registered, yet smugglers and un-lockers have stopped this from happening. The expected revenue may even have already been earmarked for something else (i.e. paying off a loan, extra R&D money, etc.) This is a loss and this loss is costing Apple money
Yeah I'm working on a replacement. It's a company laptop w/ company warranty so it's just a matter of submitting the trouble ticket and getting one ordered. The comment wasn't to be a knock at Dell either. It's clearly a defective battery and Dell doesn't make the batter (probably Sony). The point is that batteries will need to be replaced, and I don't want to sacrifice my whole machine for however long it takes to replace it.
Your CEO doesn't sound like the typical globetrotting exec. Most globetrotting execs (or at least globetrotting businesspeople) need as much utility out of their laptop as possible. I should know, I'm a globetrotting consultant. Right now the only appeal that the Air has is weight. Most globetrotting execs don't just check e-mail and surf the web. So let's paint a picture of what a real globetrotter uses a computer for...
Wake up (at 4am) and quickly check e-mail and print boarding pass. Off to the airport. Check e-mail again while waiting to board. Get on plane. Cruising altitude reached, so out comes the laptop and start working on that presentation (here's where battery life and being able to replace that battery when it dies comes in). Arrive at destination, and off to client. Arrive at client and walk straight into meeting. Hook up laptop up to projector (here' where all of those external ports come into play). Meeting finishes. You do some more things at a guest cubicle. You break out a mouse for comfort (1 usb port) then someone comes by with a document on a memory stick (need another usb port, but the Air is all out of 'em) They want you to view a presentation that's on DVD or VCD (here's where that optical drive comes in handy and not so you can watch a hollywood movie - there's no time for that). End of day, go back to hotel. You need the internet. No wireless here, so it's gotta be wired (yeah that wired ethernet port really comes in handy right about now). Go to sleep.
So let's recap. What is really important to a globetrotting exec? Versatility. You need lots of standard ports (VGA, lots of USB, etc.) and an optical drive, which Air doesn't have. You need reliable battery life. This means that when the battery is dead, as in won't hold it's charge, you can replace that battery. My 1 year old Dell already has 32% health, which means 1 hour of battery life. Tomorrow when I'm actually in the same state as my office, I'll pick up a new one and off I go. Air does not have a removeable battery. And at the end of the day, you need durability. Usually I'm not checking my laptop (or anything) with the airlines, but it gets crammed in to overhead bins, kicked under the seat, thrown into TSA x-ray bins, dropped, bumped, etc. ThinkPads are known for their durability. I can't speak for Mac on this, so I won't knock the Air for this, but it is a concern for the globetrotter. In closing, your CEO is not a good example of the globetrotting exec. A real globetrotting exec demands much more from their laptop.
Generally, xfs and others like reiser are supported by default, but you have to "unlock" them at install time. To do this, when you first boot up the install disk, instead of just hitting Enter to launch that graphical installer (anaconda) you have to type in "linux xfs" or insert another fs of choice in the place of xfs. Not sure why they do this, but it is nice to know that it is available "out of the box".
It's called a vanity URL. Even though you type in http://catchydellurl.com/ you are redirected to http://catchy.promotion.dell.com/feb/09876/victor_bravo_charlie/this/is/long.htm. (Although it appears that this battery program one is not a vanity, but for the most part, these other non-dell domain names that are owned by dell, are vanities. The point is just marketing. You can get people to go directly to what would otherwise be a really cryptic url that only makes sense to Dell's web content management system by having them remember a really catchy simple url that sounds exactly like what they need. For instance, dell.com/open goes to dell's open source OS offerings page, but the real url is http://www.dell.com/content/topics/segtopic.aspx/ubuntu?c=us&cs=19&l=en&s=dhs&dgc=EM&cid=21690&lid=511380. I can remember dell.com/open. That other thing, not so much. So maybe it's not really Dell to blame, maybe we should be blaming their content management system or ASP.NET (holy crap I actually got an MS bash out of this thread!).
Why don't we look at this in reverse and see how ridiculous it looks...
Microsoft and the likes of the Microsoft's lobbyists have been lobbying governments to mandate the rival OOXML standard to the exclusion of any other format.
Wait a minute....that's not ridiculous at all! That's f%#&ing reality!
Seriously, we've seen plenty of stories right here on Slashdot about Microsoft trying to buy the vote. Sweden comes to mind. And frankly, you can't call it lobbying when all you are doing is pointing out that Microsoft's "open" format is not actually open.
Actually, check your owners manual. On my Dad's '06 Audi A4, the onboard computer allowed you to configure the door locks. You could change the feature you gripe about above as well as the auto-locking features most cars have, where when you start the car (or after exceeding a certain spead) the doors all automatically lock. I think my VW has the same thing, but I haven't sat down to mess with the setup yet.
Just recently I came home to find a cockroach in the LCD panel of my microwave. A true "That's disgusting, but how the hell did he get in there!??!!" moment. Well of course my first thought is to grab can of raid, a screwdriver and open the microwave up. As I get to screw number 3, I realize that this is not your typical screw. In fact, there is no way for my multi-headed screw driver to unscrew it! So now I have no way of being able to look inside my microwave and see if it's just one roach, or if it's a whole nest.
I saw a similar article on BBC News this morning. This company has advertised that it has signed agreements with all four major record labels, yet all four are denying this fact. Warner has said that they have been in talks, but that is in no way a signed agreement. If they are going to exaggerate their record company backings, then why should we believe them when they say they are iPod compatible. It doesn't make any sense. The iPod only supports Apple's FairPlay DRM, yet they say their tracks all use Windows Media DRM. Let's wait for Apple to chime in on this one before we get too excited.
Personally, I'm not excited for any music store that uses any DRM, even if the tracks are for free. I'm still restricted in how I can use the tracks. Tip of the hat to Amazon for presenting a music store that is 100% DRM free, uses a format that is widely accepted and supported as a de-facto standard, and isn't just indie music, but has backing from the big four labels.
And another thing, can we stop calling them MP3 players? That and satellite radio. TV's use radio waves, but we don't call that visual radio./rant
Once again, Microsoft has taken one of the most simple concepts (writing down what you need on a piece of paper and bringing said list with you to the store) and made it ten times more complicated and expensive.
Ok, so before we had that awful experience of having a piece of paper in the kitchen, and whenever we realized we were out of butter, or milk, or widgets, we write down on the paper. Then the list is taken with you to the store to pick out your items.
Now let's see how much Microsoft has improved this process: We still have that piece of paper in the kitchen. We still jot down items as we realize we need them. But now, before we leave for the store, we log on to ShopRite.com, transpose the entire list onto the web site, save and log-off, then leave for the store. Upon reaching the store, we log on to the cart. But if it's anything like my wedding registry experience at Macy's (I'll get into that little gem next), My cart will have to boot up first (I'll give them the benefit of the doubt and say it will take a quick 5 min). Once I've accessed my list, I begin my shopping. The list hasn't improved, it's the same list. However, now I have annoying ads. I'm going to ignore the ads, because I already have a brand preference, and if I don't, I have a price preference, which I can clearly see that brand x is cheaper (or on sale).
We haven't improved my shopping experience at all. We've actually made it worse. There are more steps, more complication, more problems to occur (technology always does break), and a lot more annoying.
This reminds me a lot of my wedding registry ordeal "as made better by Microsoft!" So it's wedding registry time, and I'm all excited because I get to shoot things with a scanner gun like a little kid. Unfortunately, Macy's doesn't use scanner guns, they have PDA's with bar code scanners. So my first thought is "well that seems overkill," but I'm also thinking that with a PDA, there may be improvements. Things I expected to see: confirmation on the screen as to the item you scanned, ability to edit the number of items you want, maybe inventory search tool to help find things your looking for, maybe even suggestions (I see you have scanned the Waterford Red Wine Glasses, you might also like the "Waterford White Wine Glasses". Disappointment hit me as the women tries to activate the first PDA. It's being slow and unresponsive, so she goes in the back to get a new one. It's also slow and unresponsive, but apparently that's what it's supposed to do, as it's loading up Windows CE. This takes a good 10 minutes of waiting and fiddling. The Macy's lady enters all of the information and we are then off to shopping. Unfortunately, this PDA doesn't have a "trigger" (my child-like hopes are tarnished). Instead, the scanner is activated by pressing two buttons on either side of the device at the same time. It sounds simple, but you have to press it in just the right way (my fiance had some difficulty with this). So that's kinda annoying, but I'm starting to get the hang of it. We scan our first item. As I had hoped, the device showed confirmation of what we had scanned, and gave an option to increase the quantity. However, Microsoft's idea of confirmation, was showing the SKU number only. HOW IS THIS EVEN REMOTELY USEFUL!?! THE NUMBER IS FUCKING 12 CHARACTERS LONG! I don't know if I ordered the set of kitchen knives with 15 pieces or 10 pieces and I don't even know if I got the right brand. Who knows, through some strange error, it could think I want a pink flowery duvet cover, but I won't know. The thing that bugged me the most though, was that every 2 minutes or so, the thing would go into standby to save on batteries. So I go to scan something, and nothing would happen. I'd try again, cause those buttons are tricky, and nothing happens. I look at the screen and it's black. I press the power button and it pops back to life. I try the scanner again "Slow down there cowboy! Windows CE needs another 30 seconds to wake up!" GO
The debate of Google Docs vs. Office 2007 is really not the real discussion here. The discussion is locally hosted vs. web hosted applications. While, yes, Google Docs is web hosted and Office 2007 is locally hosted, you arguments for or against each have nothing to do with how they are hosted. You might as well be arguing OpenOffice vs. Office 2007. As you describe, Google Docs is missing some features (OK maybe a lot of features) that people have come to expect in MS Office or OpenOffice. But is it missing anything that couldn't be implemented in the future, if not by Google, then by another online office app? The only argument against Google Docs that you make that is relevant to the real issue is the lag. We all know why this is and we all know what it will take to fix it. Essentially it comes down to bandwidth. I don't know what kind of connection you have, but even if you have 20 Mb/s FIOS, it's too slow for you. That's a problem. Unless there is some inefficiencies happening on Google's end, online apps are not going to become widespread until they can match the speed of a local app. That probably means waiting until everyone has fiber plugged directly into their homes, if not directly to their computer. The infrastructure is just not quite there yet, but it will be. I couldn't tell you when, because the change isn't so much technical as it is political. Any technical deficiency for an online app can be overcome. There are people who want this model to work, and they will find new ways to overcome those obstacles. The debate is more philosophical. In a perfect world, where there is no bandwidth problem and the online apps have all of the same features as your local apps, what are the advantages and disadvantages of each? The real issue is control. With local apps, you have complete control of what version you are running, any extra features you want to add, and how it gets stored. Some need that control, some don't. There is also control over your productivity. If the internet goes down, you have no control over that or how soon it gets fixed, yet the same can be said for power (in which regardless of where your app is located, your not using it). Hardware failure is more of an issue with local apps. If you dont' have proper backups, your screwed, but you have the control to make those backups. If it's web hosted, it's backed up far better than you ever could do yourself. Security is an issue with either method. While you can encrypt everything online, there are always vulnerabilities. There is no "man in the middle" attack on your local app as long as it stays on your local machine, however, it's probably easier to break into a home computer than it is to break into an online storage company's data center. Each have their pros and cons and there is a market available for both. I imagine that there will never be a clear winner, they will coexist. We've already been through this before. First it was just one machine, then it was mainframes with dumb terminals, then the PC was king, then client/server combined the power of the PC and the power of the mainframe into one. Now we're realizing that having a dumb terminal isn't exactly obsolete. It has a purpose and not everyone needs to have the power of a PC on their desk. However, we're not going to suddenly obsolete the PC. Both have purposes. That's why both had been used for so long at one time or another and that's why both will live on until something completely different comes along.
My grandfather was a pilot during WWII. In in those days, the radar unit in the plane was often between the pilot's legs. He went on to father 5 kids and died of cancer in the early seventies (pretty sure it was testicular cancer). Yes the radiation from radar can be very damaging, but sterility is not necessarily the end result.
Facebook WAS a college age thing. Then two things happened. First, Facebook opened its doors to anyone. Second, all of those college age Facebook users graduated. And now there is a new problem: Their college social life is not so easy to put behind you when you have Facebook constantly reminding you of that night you got totally wasted and had that embarrassing picture taken of you that you don't want your new boss/co-workers to see (you know, every night of your college career).
I always abstained from Facebook under the assumption it was a waste of time and just made stalking that much easier. Little did I know that it would be so much more detrimental to users AFTER graduation. I have many friends who ended up becoming teachers and they are having a tough time. One was an idiot and didn't have any access controls on his account at all. His high school students found his page and had a great time making their teacher miserable for all of the drunk pictures and videos and all of the other stuff that makes an authority figure look more like a joke. He learned from his mistake and locked everything down and tried to eliminate his online footprint until his younger brother posted a video on YouTube. Yeah the kids found that one too and he nearly got fired. Another teacher friend has learned from others. She's even taking it a step further. She is urgently asking friends to remove her name tag from all of the pictures of her posted on their accounts, but that is proving difficult. It turns out that even if you lock down your own account, there is still the matter of your friends' accounts that have all kinds of references to you, especially pictures. It is nearly impossible to remove your internet footprint.
To this end, I don't see why those with careers bother with it since it has become such a liability now. Office politics are bad enough without merging your social life in the mix. The only way to have a "safe" profile is to keep it completely boring. No goofy pictures, no oddball friends, and absolutely no postings by friends on your wall. This of course defeats the purpose of social networking because no one wants to be friends with a boring loser.
I guess the old adage is still holds true: The only way to win is to not play at all.
Are we seriously still harping on the whole "college kids are the only people who pirate content" issue? Because it's pretty outdated now. That whole trend happened fast and then began to taper off really quick. The reason? Well, when Napster (the real one) hit the scene and blew the p2p doors wide open, not everyone had a broadband connection in their home. Colleges and Universities, on the other hand, had some of the fastest connections around. Broadband was the key here. It may not seem like it nowadays, but mp3's were big. It would take me at least a half hour or more to download one song on my dial-up connection (on a good day), and that was one at a time. At the same time, my older sister, who was in college, could start a download, begin listening to it while it downloads, and the download would finish before she's done listening. Essentially a feux-stream. It wasn't even until a few years later that dsl was available in my area and it was still expensive and unreliable. I had one friend who got it at his house and we pretty much spent all of our spare time over there downloading music and eventually movies, tv shows, and music videos when the p2p clients evolved enough. When we weren't infringing copyright, we were playing online video games like Team Fortress. But this activity was isolated to only this kids house. When we weren't there, we could not do these things because no one else had broadband. Then I went to college. All of a sudden, me and a good 75% of the rest of the freshman population had 24hr access to high speed internet for the first time. We all had something downloading at all times. Not because we wanted to deliberately rip off the music and movie industry, but just because we could. It's like when you get your driver's license. You may not have anywhere to go, but you'll go out for a drive anyway. Just because you can. Anyhow, soon the residential broadband market caught up. Cable internet was more affordable, DSL was more widely available and much more reliable (I know Verizon improved the DSL scene in my area greatly). So now it wasn't just the college kids who had unlimited access to all of the content they wanted for free. Furthermore, the college networks are no longer the fastest out there. Technology improved, but also the college networks were choked with all of the massive downloading (damn tubes!).
So where are we now? Well, everyone, college and non-college folk alike, have the same unfettered access to p2p technology. What they decide to do with that technology is not determined by whether they are on a college campus or not. In fact, once that initial hype over being able to download anything in seconds subsided, I became much more selective about what I downloaded. This was the case with many people I knew. After a while, you start to ask yourself, "Do I really NEED to download this?" where before it didn't matter if you needed to, you just did anyway, because you could. At the same time, the **AA was rattling their sabers over lawsuits and iTunes hit a level of maturity. People began go legit in droves. So is college any different than anyone else?
So some may argue that college campuses do a lot of incestuous p2p sharing. Where someone sets up a Direct Connect server and the massive student population just shares among themselves. Well yes this happens, but it's not as widespread as you may think. First and foremost, this activity violates many schools network use policies. P2p servers are also easy to spot because you notice 90% of the schools bandwidth is being taken up by a single ip address on the third floor of a dormitory. This means that a p2p server will not last long, as the IT department will either block the traffic or just outright revoke that individuals internet privileges. Even early on when p2p hit big, a lot of schools banned p2p apps from their networks. This was usually a futile effort because once a new app came out, everyone jumped on the new one and the game of cat and mouse began.
Great article. This guy pretty much sums up what we've all been trying to say here on/., but has a lot of interesting facts about some of Gene's litigious adventures. Being a music writer, he also has some good insights on the industry, old and new.
I also have thought about the weight issue. A possibility for addressing this, in addition to having standard connections, etc. would be to split up the battery pack into smaller removable cells. For instance, if you have the battery equivalent of a "quarter tank", you can take out the smaller empty cells and replace them, while leaving the remaining fully or partially charged cells in. It would also make transporting them easier because you could move less with more trips. You could also "top off" without having to change the entire battery pack.
Addressing the fact that standardizing this early would limit innovation in design and technology, if you break the batteries down into smaller pieces, you could fit them more ways. Also, you would just need to standardize the connector format, whereas you would purchase the appropriate voltage (like selecting your octane) and the battery technology itself (LiIon vs whatever else) can change infinitely as long as it can still plug in the same way.
I was just thinking about how to reduce the recharge time when it hit me. Why try to reduce recharge time, when you could just change the batter? The batter would still be rechargeable and it would be a standard design with a standard hook-up. You pull into your "energy station" on your long haul trips. Un-plug the battery, carry it over to the excahnge counter. You turn in your dead battery and they give you a fully charged one. You pay for the charge difference between your old battery and your new battery. The "energy-station" then throws the dead battery on the charger. Once it's charged, they hand it off to the next customer. The distribution model would be much like getting a new propane tank for your grill, beer kegs and water cooler jugs. Has anyone considered this before? If not then...ummmm don't steal my idea cause this could make me rich.
You've done a great thing and it is something that I would like to see more schools do. My father was recently elected to the school board in the district where I was educated from Kindergarten all the way through High School. During a recent board meeting, they were discussing week areas. I had dropped by to visit my parents about a week later and my father took the opportunity to ask me about what technology improvements could be made, or where the school was week technologically. While it's been almost six years since graduating from High School, it was hard to address this school specifically, but I did have one major point I wanted to push:
Teach kids how to use computers, not how to use specific software.
This means you don't teach kids how to use MS Office, you teach them how to use a word processor, a spreadsheet, etc. I was fortunate to be going to school in the district in the middle of the Apple -> Microsoft switch. My first experience with a computer in school was the Apple IIgs. It was the IIgs that I learned how to type on. Later they refreshed to Macs and I learned how to use spreadsheets, word processors, presentation software, and even a small scale personal database. A few years later the whole district went MS, but the transition was easy. In fact it made learning MS Office so much easier because I already new what I could achieve, it was just about figuring out the steps to take.
My suggestion is to have a diverse computing environment. Not just Windows, not just Linux, and not just Mac. All three. Scattered everywhere in a non-organized manner. A Mac next to Linux next to Windows all in the same lab even. Maybe more specialized placement where the art department has more Macs.
One of the best arguments I have come up with, especially when talking to someone from the business world about teaching technological diversity, it the E-Mail example. While becoming dated, it goes like this: If you look at job postings, especially for administrative work, you see things like "Must know MS Outlook" or "Must have experience with Lotus Notes". These being two of the major office communication tools out there. Well which do you choose? Right now the choice might be obvious, but how do you know that by the time the students are in the job market, they will still even be using that application. Don't teach them a specific application, teach them how to use a class of applications.
Facebook has ALREADY jumped the shark, just as your subject claims. It all happened when they opened their doors to anyone and everyone. While I'm a conscientious objector to social networking sites (waste of time), I was in the middle of my college education when Facebook hit the scene. Facebook was the shit. Everyone in college used it as it was a way for people to communicate with others that were on campus, or long lost high school friends. It was easy to send out party notices and great for posting all of the drunken pictures from said party. It was also much more secure than MySpace in the sense that you could set proper access controls, and the interface was much more usable. It was identified as a "College Thing" which made all of the MySpace using high schoolers to desperately want in. Then the doors opened, all of the wannabe's were suddenly "cool enough to be allowed in" and the massive switch began. Market share rises, advertisers and spammers flock accordingly. Stupid meaningless variations on the "poke" appear like "sending drinks" and now my fiance's Facebook wall has a video of Shrek and Donkey gangbanging princess fiona and Firefox is throwing up red flags on half the links. Facebook is now just like MySpace. Just wait. The next "exclusive" social network will appear offering a cleaner interface, no spam, better access controls and a more useful network of users. It will then gain traction within that exclusive group and then sell out to the rest of the world, then die like the rest. Lather, Rinse, Repeat.
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I disagree. At a minimal level, what FOSS does is put pressure on the non-free products to become better. You gave the example of MS Office. You are correct that OpenOffice.org (arguabley) doesn't offer much more to the user other than just being FOSS (dont' forget it runs on Linux too). However, what it does do, is put pressure on MS to justify their high price tag. If you are going to charge me $300 for an office suite that I could otherwise get for free, it better be worth $300 more. It also puts the pressure on MS to bring the price down. Is Office really worth that much money? Considering there is a free alternative, no it's not. The extra features I will get for $300, is not worth $300 to me. Maybe to some, but not to me. That's for the consumer to decide. Just look at the latest version of Office. It's the most radically different version we've seen (for better or worse). This is a direct response to OpenOffice.org.
Firefox and IE7 are another example of this. IE didn't have any significant improvements until Firefox came along, and now IE is being very actively improved upon. It took five years to go from IE6 to IE7, yet now IE8 is already being developed. However, in this scenario, the FOSS product was actually a major improvement over the existing non-FOSS product. Many want all software to be FOSS. I'm still not completely sold on that. I think everyone should have the choice and sometimes it takes a well payed developer to get the job done because its hard to find someone to volunteer their time for a rather uninteresting (yet necessary) application. Right now, I think the two complement eachother. FOSS creates competition in areas that otherwise would be dominated by monopolies. FOSS makes applications available that would otherwise be too expensive for a single person or a small business to afford. This is quite empowering. Think about it for a minute. Thanks Apache or MySQL the singular person with modest budget can implement an enterprise class web server or database. The playing field has just been leveled.
I worked out a bartering agreement with my local tree union. I give them CO2, they give me O2. Everybody's happy.
You got it! Familiarity is the key. Maybe the web banner doesn't directly initiate the sale, but it does help create familiarity. Take one of Slashdot's banner ads for Baracuda networking equipment. Prior to being a Slashdotter, I was not aware of this company. But thanks to their ads on Slashdot, I know the exist and I know that they make routers, etc. Being just a Slashdot ad, I don't pay too much attention to it. However, I keep seeing ad posters in airports for this company. That catches my eye. Since so many web ads are just junk, you don't pay much attention them, but now I have "corroborating evidence" that this company is legit and at least are big enough to have a decent ad budget. Now I am certainly not in the market for a router, but if I were, prior to seeing these ads, I would not have even considered Baracuda. In fact, I would not have heard of them at all. Now that I have some familiarity, I would probably take the next step of researching the company and its products in more detail. This may or may not lead to a sale, but it certainly put me on the right track. As the commentary here today suggests, we don't really know much about how big a role various ads play, but at least Microsoft is making an effort to understand it. That's a benefit to all of us. For all we know, they could determine that web ads are completely useless and the industry of littering web pages with more ads than content may come to an end (finally!).
Once again, no one on /. understands what opportunity cost is. The parent is absolutely right and the grand parent has no accounting background.
Opportunity cost, in short, is the cost of NOT doing business. This means that Apple could be making $X IF every iPhone is registered by AT&T or any other cooperating carrier outside the US. This is not just fake number. This number is important for many reasons. Mainly, if we do X instead of Y, what revenue would Y have brought in, and is that more or less than if we do X. Or in more real world terms, should we use our extra profit on employee bonuses, or should we expand the company? If we were to expand the company, what is our potential revenue? If we instead go the bonuses route, then the potential revenue from expansion, is the opportunity cost. This helps you decide which route to take.
It is also important in industrial insurance policies. If a hurricane hits a factory in Puerto Rico, there is the physical loss (property damage, lost inventory, rebuilding) and then there is the opportunity cost of not being able to produce more of the product while rebuilding taking place. Instead of making X widgets, we can only make X-Y widgets, which means less revenue. This is factored into the insurance payout in the event of a such an occurance.
Similarly, Apple has produced 1.4 million iPhones that will not be registered(thus preventing the registration revenue). It was Apples intent to have these phones registered, yet smugglers and un-lockers have stopped this from happening. The expected revenue may even have already been earmarked for something else (i.e. paying off a loan, extra R&D money, etc.) This is a loss and this loss is costing Apple money
Yeah I'm working on a replacement. It's a company laptop w/ company warranty so it's just a matter of submitting the trouble ticket and getting one ordered. The comment wasn't to be a knock at Dell either. It's clearly a defective battery and Dell doesn't make the batter (probably Sony). The point is that batteries will need to be replaced, and I don't want to sacrifice my whole machine for however long it takes to replace it.
Your CEO doesn't sound like the typical globetrotting exec. Most globetrotting execs (or at least globetrotting businesspeople) need as much utility out of their laptop as possible. I should know, I'm a globetrotting consultant. Right now the only appeal that the Air has is weight. Most globetrotting execs don't just check e-mail and surf the web. So let's paint a picture of what a real globetrotter uses a computer for...
Wake up (at 4am) and quickly check e-mail and print boarding pass. Off to the airport. Check e-mail again while waiting to board. Get on plane. Cruising altitude reached, so out comes the laptop and start working on that presentation (here's where battery life and being able to replace that battery when it dies comes in). Arrive at destination, and off to client. Arrive at client and walk straight into meeting. Hook up laptop up to projector (here' where all of those external ports come into play). Meeting finishes. You do some more things at a guest cubicle. You break out a mouse for comfort (1 usb port) then someone comes by with a document on a memory stick (need another usb port, but the Air is all out of 'em) They want you to view a presentation that's on DVD or VCD (here's where that optical drive comes in handy and not so you can watch a hollywood movie - there's no time for that). End of day, go back to hotel. You need the internet. No wireless here, so it's gotta be wired (yeah that wired ethernet port really comes in handy right about now). Go to sleep.
So let's recap. What is really important to a globetrotting exec? Versatility. You need lots of standard ports (VGA, lots of USB, etc.) and an optical drive, which Air doesn't have. You need reliable battery life. This means that when the battery is dead, as in won't hold it's charge, you can replace that battery. My 1 year old Dell already has 32% health, which means 1 hour of battery life. Tomorrow when I'm actually in the same state as my office, I'll pick up a new one and off I go. Air does not have a removeable battery. And at the end of the day, you need durability. Usually I'm not checking my laptop (or anything) with the airlines, but it gets crammed in to overhead bins, kicked under the seat, thrown into TSA x-ray bins, dropped, bumped, etc. ThinkPads are known for their durability. I can't speak for Mac on this, so I won't knock the Air for this, but it is a concern for the globetrotter. In closing, your CEO is not a good example of the globetrotting exec. A real globetrotting exec demands much more from their laptop.
Generally, xfs and others like reiser are supported by default, but you have to "unlock" them at install time. To do this, when you first boot up the install disk, instead of just hitting Enter to launch that graphical installer (anaconda) you have to type in "linux xfs" or insert another fs of choice in the place of xfs. Not sure why they do this, but it is nice to know that it is available "out of the box".
It's called a vanity URL. Even though you type in http://catchydellurl.com/ you are redirected to http://catchy.promotion.dell.com/feb/09876/victor_bravo_charlie/this/is/long.htm. (Although it appears that this battery program one is not a vanity, but for the most part, these other non-dell domain names that are owned by dell, are vanities. The point is just marketing. You can get people to go directly to what would otherwise be a really cryptic url that only makes sense to Dell's web content management system by having them remember a really catchy simple url that sounds exactly like what they need. For instance, dell.com/open goes to dell's open source OS offerings page, but the real url is http://www.dell.com/content/topics/segtopic.aspx/ubuntu?c=us&cs=19&l=en&s=dhs&dgc=EM&cid=21690&lid=511380. I can remember dell.com/open. That other thing, not so much. So maybe it's not really Dell to blame, maybe we should be blaming their content management system or ASP.NET (holy crap I actually got an MS bash out of this thread!).
Seriously, we've seen plenty of stories right here on Slashdot about Microsoft trying to buy the vote. Sweden comes to mind. And frankly, you can't call it lobbying when all you are doing is pointing out that Microsoft's "open" format is not actually open.
Amen to that!
Just recently I came home to find a cockroach in the LCD panel of my microwave. A true "That's disgusting, but how the hell did he get in there!??!!" moment. Well of course my first thought is to grab can of raid, a screwdriver and open the microwave up. As I get to screw number 3, I realize that this is not your typical screw. In fact, there is no way for my multi-headed screw driver to unscrew it! So now I have no way of being able to look inside my microwave and see if it's just one roach, or if it's a whole nest.
I saw a similar article on BBC News this morning. This company has advertised that it has signed agreements with all four major record labels, yet all four are denying this fact. Warner has said that they have been in talks, but that is in no way a signed agreement. If they are going to exaggerate their record company backings, then why should we believe them when they say they are iPod compatible. It doesn't make any sense. The iPod only supports Apple's FairPlay DRM, yet they say their tracks all use Windows Media DRM. Let's wait for Apple to chime in on this one before we get too excited.
/rant
Personally, I'm not excited for any music store that uses any DRM, even if the tracks are for free. I'm still restricted in how I can use the tracks. Tip of the hat to Amazon for presenting a music store that is 100% DRM free, uses a format that is widely accepted and supported as a de-facto standard, and isn't just indie music, but has backing from the big four labels.
And another thing, can we stop calling them MP3 players? That and satellite radio. TV's use radio waves, but we don't call that visual radio.
Once again, Microsoft has taken one of the most simple concepts (writing down what you need on a piece of paper and bringing said list with you to the store) and made it ten times more complicated and expensive.
Ok, so before we had that awful experience of having a piece of paper in the kitchen, and whenever we realized we were out of butter, or milk, or widgets, we write down on the paper. Then the list is taken with you to the store to pick out your items.
Now let's see how much Microsoft has improved this process: We still have that piece of paper in the kitchen. We still jot down items as we realize we need them. But now, before we leave for the store, we log on to ShopRite.com, transpose the entire list onto the web site, save and log-off, then leave for the store. Upon reaching the store, we log on to the cart. But if it's anything like my wedding registry experience at Macy's (I'll get into that little gem next), My cart will have to boot up first (I'll give them the benefit of the doubt and say it will take a quick 5 min). Once I've accessed my list, I begin my shopping. The list hasn't improved, it's the same list. However, now I have annoying ads. I'm going to ignore the ads, because I already have a brand preference, and if I don't, I have a price preference, which I can clearly see that brand x is cheaper (or on sale).
We haven't improved my shopping experience at all. We've actually made it worse. There are more steps, more complication, more problems to occur (technology always does break), and a lot more annoying.
This reminds me a lot of my wedding registry ordeal "as made better by Microsoft!" So it's wedding registry time, and I'm all excited because I get to shoot things with a scanner gun like a little kid. Unfortunately, Macy's doesn't use scanner guns, they have PDA's with bar code scanners. So my first thought is "well that seems overkill," but I'm also thinking that with a PDA, there may be improvements. Things I expected to see: confirmation on the screen as to the item you scanned, ability to edit the number of items you want, maybe inventory search tool to help find things your looking for, maybe even suggestions (I see you have scanned the Waterford Red Wine Glasses, you might also like the "Waterford White Wine Glasses". Disappointment hit me as the women tries to activate the first PDA. It's being slow and unresponsive, so she goes in the back to get a new one. It's also slow and unresponsive, but apparently that's what it's supposed to do, as it's loading up Windows CE. This takes a good 10 minutes of waiting and fiddling. The Macy's lady enters all of the information and we are then off to shopping. Unfortunately, this PDA doesn't have a "trigger" (my child-like hopes are tarnished). Instead, the scanner is activated by pressing two buttons on either side of the device at the same time. It sounds simple, but you have to press it in just the right way (my fiance had some difficulty with this). So that's kinda annoying, but I'm starting to get the hang of it. We scan our first item. As I had hoped, the device showed confirmation of what we had scanned, and gave an option to increase the quantity. However, Microsoft's idea of confirmation, was showing the SKU number only. HOW IS THIS EVEN REMOTELY USEFUL!?! THE NUMBER IS FUCKING 12 CHARACTERS LONG! I don't know if I ordered the set of kitchen knives with 15 pieces or 10 pieces and I don't even know if I got the right brand. Who knows, through some strange error, it could think I want a pink flowery duvet cover, but I won't know. The thing that bugged me the most though, was that every 2 minutes or so, the thing would go into standby to save on batteries. So I go to scan something, and nothing would happen. I'd try again, cause those buttons are tricky, and nothing happens. I look at the screen and it's black. I press the power button and it pops back to life. I try the scanner again "Slow down there cowboy! Windows CE needs another 30 seconds to wake up!" GO
The debate of Google Docs vs. Office 2007 is really not the real discussion here. The discussion is locally hosted vs. web hosted applications. While, yes, Google Docs is web hosted and Office 2007 is locally hosted, you arguments for or against each have nothing to do with how they are hosted. You might as well be arguing OpenOffice vs. Office 2007. As you describe, Google Docs is missing some features (OK maybe a lot of features) that people have come to expect in MS Office or OpenOffice. But is it missing anything that couldn't be implemented in the future, if not by Google, then by another online office app? The only argument against Google Docs that you make that is relevant to the real issue is the lag. We all know why this is and we all know what it will take to fix it. Essentially it comes down to bandwidth. I don't know what kind of connection you have, but even if you have 20 Mb/s FIOS, it's too slow for you. That's a problem. Unless there is some inefficiencies happening on Google's end, online apps are not going to become widespread until they can match the speed of a local app. That probably means waiting until everyone has fiber plugged directly into their homes, if not directly to their computer. The infrastructure is just not quite there yet, but it will be. I couldn't tell you when, because the change isn't so much technical as it is political. Any technical deficiency for an online app can be overcome. There are people who want this model to work, and they will find new ways to overcome those obstacles. The debate is more philosophical. In a perfect world, where there is no bandwidth problem and the online apps have all of the same features as your local apps, what are the advantages and disadvantages of each? The real issue is control. With local apps, you have complete control of what version you are running, any extra features you want to add, and how it gets stored. Some need that control, some don't. There is also control over your productivity. If the internet goes down, you have no control over that or how soon it gets fixed, yet the same can be said for power (in which regardless of where your app is located, your not using it). Hardware failure is more of an issue with local apps. If you dont' have proper backups, your screwed, but you have the control to make those backups. If it's web hosted, it's backed up far better than you ever could do yourself. Security is an issue with either method. While you can encrypt everything online, there are always vulnerabilities. There is no "man in the middle" attack on your local app as long as it stays on your local machine, however, it's probably easier to break into a home computer than it is to break into an online storage company's data center. Each have their pros and cons and there is a market available for both. I imagine that there will never be a clear winner, they will coexist. We've already been through this before. First it was just one machine, then it was mainframes with dumb terminals, then the PC was king, then client/server combined the power of the PC and the power of the mainframe into one. Now we're realizing that having a dumb terminal isn't exactly obsolete. It has a purpose and not everyone needs to have the power of a PC on their desk. However, we're not going to suddenly obsolete the PC. Both have purposes. That's why both had been used for so long at one time or another and that's why both will live on until something completely different comes along.
My grandfather was a pilot during WWII. In in those days, the radar unit in the plane was often between the pilot's legs. He went on to father 5 kids and died of cancer in the early seventies (pretty sure it was testicular cancer). Yes the radiation from radar can be very damaging, but sterility is not necessarily the end result.
ABBA
Facebook WAS a college age thing. Then two things happened. First, Facebook opened its doors to anyone. Second, all of those college age Facebook users graduated. And now there is a new problem: Their college social life is not so easy to put behind you when you have Facebook constantly reminding you of that night you got totally wasted and had that embarrassing picture taken of you that you don't want your new boss/co-workers to see (you know, every night of your college career).
I always abstained from Facebook under the assumption it was a waste of time and just made stalking that much easier. Little did I know that it would be so much more detrimental to users AFTER graduation. I have many friends who ended up becoming teachers and they are having a tough time. One was an idiot and didn't have any access controls on his account at all. His high school students found his page and had a great time making their teacher miserable for all of the drunk pictures and videos and all of the other stuff that makes an authority figure look more like a joke. He learned from his mistake and locked everything down and tried to eliminate his online footprint until his younger brother posted a video on YouTube. Yeah the kids found that one too and he nearly got fired. Another teacher friend has learned from others. She's even taking it a step further. She is urgently asking friends to remove her name tag from all of the pictures of her posted on their accounts, but that is proving difficult. It turns out that even if you lock down your own account, there is still the matter of your friends' accounts that have all kinds of references to you, especially pictures. It is nearly impossible to remove your internet footprint. To this end, I don't see why those with careers bother with it since it has become such a liability now. Office politics are bad enough without merging your social life in the mix. The only way to have a "safe" profile is to keep it completely boring. No goofy pictures, no oddball friends, and absolutely no postings by friends on your wall. This of course defeats the purpose of social networking because no one wants to be friends with a boring loser.
I guess the old adage is still holds true: The only way to win is to not play at all.
Are we seriously still harping on the whole "college kids are the only people who pirate content" issue? Because it's pretty outdated now. That whole trend happened fast and then began to taper off really quick. The reason? Well, when Napster (the real one) hit the scene and blew the p2p doors wide open, not everyone had a broadband connection in their home. Colleges and Universities, on the other hand, had some of the fastest connections around. Broadband was the key here. It may not seem like it nowadays, but mp3's were big. It would take me at least a half hour or more to download one song on my dial-up connection (on a good day), and that was one at a time. At the same time, my older sister, who was in college, could start a download, begin listening to it while it downloads, and the download would finish before she's done listening. Essentially a feux-stream. It wasn't even until a few years later that dsl was available in my area and it was still expensive and unreliable. I had one friend who got it at his house and we pretty much spent all of our spare time over there downloading music and eventually movies, tv shows, and music videos when the p2p clients evolved enough. When we weren't infringing copyright, we were playing online video games like Team Fortress. But this activity was isolated to only this kids house. When we weren't there, we could not do these things because no one else had broadband. Then I went to college. All of a sudden, me and a good 75% of the rest of the freshman population had 24hr access to high speed internet for the first time. We all had something downloading at all times. Not because we wanted to deliberately rip off the music and movie industry, but just because we could. It's like when you get your driver's license. You may not have anywhere to go, but you'll go out for a drive anyway. Just because you can. Anyhow, soon the residential broadband market caught up. Cable internet was more affordable, DSL was more widely available and much more reliable (I know Verizon improved the DSL scene in my area greatly). So now it wasn't just the college kids who had unlimited access to all of the content they wanted for free. Furthermore, the college networks are no longer the fastest out there. Technology improved, but also the college networks were choked with all of the massive downloading (damn tubes!).
So where are we now? Well, everyone, college and non-college folk alike, have the same unfettered access to p2p technology. What they decide to do with that technology is not determined by whether they are on a college campus or not. In fact, once that initial hype over being able to download anything in seconds subsided, I became much more selective about what I downloaded. This was the case with many people I knew. After a while, you start to ask yourself, "Do I really NEED to download this?" where before it didn't matter if you needed to, you just did anyway, because you could. At the same time, the **AA was rattling their sabers over lawsuits and iTunes hit a level of maturity. People began go legit in droves. So is college any different than anyone else?
So some may argue that college campuses do a lot of incestuous p2p sharing. Where someone sets up a Direct Connect server and the massive student population just shares among themselves. Well yes this happens, but it's not as widespread as you may think. First and foremost, this activity violates many schools network use policies. P2p servers are also easy to spot because you notice 90% of the schools bandwidth is being taken up by a single ip address on the third floor of a dormitory. This means that a p2p server will not last long, as the IT department will either block the traffic or just outright revoke that individuals internet privileges. Even early on when p2p hit big, a lot of schools banned p2p apps from their networks. This was usually a futile effort because once a new app came out, everyone jumped on the new one and the game of cat and mouse began.
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Great article. This guy pretty much sums up what we've all been trying to say here on /., but has a lot of interesting facts about some of Gene's litigious adventures. Being a music writer, he also has some good insights on the industry, old and new.
I also have thought about the weight issue. A possibility for addressing this, in addition to having standard connections, etc. would be to split up the battery pack into smaller removable cells. For instance, if you have the battery equivalent of a "quarter tank", you can take out the smaller empty cells and replace them, while leaving the remaining fully or partially charged cells in. It would also make transporting them easier because you could move less with more trips. You could also "top off" without having to change the entire battery pack.
Addressing the fact that standardizing this early would limit innovation in design and technology, if you break the batteries down into smaller pieces, you could fit them more ways. Also, you would just need to standardize the connector format, whereas you would purchase the appropriate voltage (like selecting your octane) and the battery technology itself (LiIon vs whatever else) can change infinitely as long as it can still plug in the same way.
I was just thinking about how to reduce the recharge time when it hit me. Why try to reduce recharge time, when you could just change the batter? The batter would still be rechargeable and it would be a standard design with a standard hook-up. You pull into your "energy station" on your long haul trips. Un-plug the battery, carry it over to the excahnge counter. You turn in your dead battery and they give you a fully charged one. You pay for the charge difference between your old battery and your new battery. The "energy-station" then throws the dead battery on the charger. Once it's charged, they hand it off to the next customer. The distribution model would be much like getting a new propane tank for your grill, beer kegs and water cooler jugs. Has anyone considered this before? If not then...ummmm don't steal my idea cause this could make me rich.
It's HERBIE Hancock
...idiots
You did finish the rest of the movie, right? I have to admit the park was pretty cool up until the dinosaurs started eating everyone.
You've done a great thing and it is something that I would like to see more schools do. My father was recently elected to the school board in the district where I was educated from Kindergarten all the way through High School. During a recent board meeting, they were discussing week areas. I had dropped by to visit my parents about a week later and my father took the opportunity to ask me about what technology improvements could be made, or where the school was week technologically. While it's been almost six years since graduating from High School, it was hard to address this school specifically, but I did have one major point I wanted to push:
Teach kids how to use computers, not how to use specific software.
This means you don't teach kids how to use MS Office, you teach them how to use a word processor, a spreadsheet, etc. I was fortunate to be going to school in the district in the middle of the Apple -> Microsoft switch. My first experience with a computer in school was the Apple IIgs. It was the IIgs that I learned how to type on. Later they refreshed to Macs and I learned how to use spreadsheets, word processors, presentation software, and even a small scale personal database. A few years later the whole district went MS, but the transition was easy. In fact it made learning MS Office so much easier because I already new what I could achieve, it was just about figuring out the steps to take.
My suggestion is to have a diverse computing environment. Not just Windows, not just Linux, and not just Mac. All three. Scattered everywhere in a non-organized manner. A Mac next to Linux next to Windows all in the same lab even. Maybe more specialized placement where the art department has more Macs.
One of the best arguments I have come up with, especially when talking to someone from the business world about teaching technological diversity, it the E-Mail example. While becoming dated, it goes like this: If you look at job postings, especially for administrative work, you see things like "Must know MS Outlook" or "Must have experience with Lotus Notes". These being two of the major office communication tools out there. Well which do you choose? Right now the choice might be obvious, but how do you know that by the time the students are in the job market, they will still even be using that application. Don't teach them a specific application, teach them how to use a class of applications.
Facebook has ALREADY jumped the shark, just as your subject claims. It all happened when they opened their doors to anyone and everyone. While I'm a conscientious objector to social networking sites (waste of time), I was in the middle of my college education when Facebook hit the scene. Facebook was the shit. Everyone in college used it as it was a way for people to communicate with others that were on campus, or long lost high school friends. It was easy to send out party notices and great for posting all of the drunken pictures from said party. It was also much more secure than MySpace in the sense that you could set proper access controls, and the interface was much more usable. It was identified as a "College Thing" which made all of the MySpace using high schoolers to desperately want in. Then the doors opened, all of the wannabe's were suddenly "cool enough to be allowed in" and the massive switch began. Market share rises, advertisers and spammers flock accordingly. Stupid meaningless variations on the "poke" appear like "sending drinks" and now my fiance's Facebook wall has a video of Shrek and Donkey gangbanging princess fiona and Firefox is throwing up red flags on half the links. Facebook is now just like MySpace. Just wait. The next "exclusive" social network will appear offering a cleaner interface, no spam, better access controls and a more useful network of users. It will then gain traction within that exclusive group and then sell out to the rest of the world, then die like the rest. Lather, Rinse, Repeat.