Warner Brothers is one of the largest studios in all of Hollywood, with movie production, TV production, animation production, plus its own TV network. Not to mention one of the largest film libraries in all of Hollywood.
Time, Inc. runs some extremely influential magazines: Time, Life, Sports Illustrated, Fortune, and others.
DC Comics has become a major influence in the comics industry. Their copyrighted properties are worth billions.
HBO Networks owns HBO (through several channels) and Cinemax (through several channels), plus TVKO pay-per-view.
Time-Warner Cable owns 20% of all cable systems in the USA.
Warner Brothers Records (through its various labels) has a massive amount of recordings done per year.
When you combine the mass media power of Time-Warner with 21 million AOL subscribers, the result will be the most powerful mass media company in the world, no contest. This is frightening potential to stifle free speech as the AOL Time Warner conglomerate can shut out competitors in many entertainment markets.
The decision by American Online to buy ALL of Time-Warner has extremely frightening possibilities, to say the least.
The Time-Warner conglomerate already controls a large fraction of what we see on TV, hear on radio and read in magazines; add in AOL's huge online presence and they control a large portion of what we read on the Internet, too.
I think the FTC _may_ ask many questions about this, because of its severe anti-trust implications. It's like if Microsoft were to buy out either Symantec or Corel....
If I remember it, when Bill Gaines was forced to change the format of MAD from a comic book to magazine format (no thanks to EC Comics being forced to close it comics line from public pressure in the middle 1950's), he hired a whole new group of artists to do the work in the new format. One of the best-known of that group was Don Martin, who was immediately popular for his quirky, "sick" humor style. The "Don Martin Looks At...." parodies are some of the very best work in the history of MAD.
What people frequently forget is that when MAD went from a comic book format to a magazine format in 1955, one of the first artists the late William Gaines hired was one Don Martin.
Martin's quirky (but very funny) style of cartoon work was truly unique and was a major mainstay at MAD until he had that unfortunate falling out with MAD back in 1988.
1. RAM size. People today should be running at bare minimum 64 MB, with 128 MB of RAM preferred. Even Linux users who run graphical environments like KDE or Gnome will benefit from 128 MB of RAM.
2. Get a MUCH faster hard drive. While SCSI is the preferable solution, it's still quite expensive to implement, mostly due to the higher cost of SCSI host adapter and UW/UW2-SCSI hard drives. If your operating system can take advantage of the PIIX4E Intel chipset implmentation, you can do bus-mastering on ATA-33/66 IDE hard drives, which lifts a big load off the CPU; in that case, a good 7200 RPM hard drive is a must.
3. Get a faster graphics card. If the new graphics card has drivers supported by the operating system, then you will get faster redraws everywhere (even beyond the 3-D graphics acceleration so much touted nowadays).
I have to ask just what kind of character support this "Red Flag Linux" is supposed to have. Will it be Simplified Chinese and/or Traditional Chinese?
Remember, Windows 2000 supports both Chinese character sets through Unicode, the international standard for foreign character sets. Unicode supports Latin, Cyrillic, both Chinese sets, Japanese, Hindi, Arabic, Hebrew, Thai and other character sets I don't remember offhand without having to do complicated changes to the OS just to change character displays.
Actually, what MacOS X ought to have is "predefined" desktop themes for people who have vision problems (it's similar to Windows' Accessibility Features configuration).
That way, with one mouse click older folks who have serious vision impairment can still read the MacOS screen without fiddling around with all those options in the MacOS Control Panel.
I think if you have read the authorized biography of William Henry Gates III (GATES by Stephen Manes and Paul Andrews), the mentality of programmers in 1975 to 1978 at Microsoft was come in at noon, program until 8 pm, go out for a meal at a fast food joint, then see a movie, then back for nocturnal coding until the wee hours, then home to crash and back again at noon to start the cycle all over again. Alas, that work, work and work mentality meant that personal hygiene and personal appearances were way down on the priority scale.
My brother (who works at a computer animation company) has done all-nighters, but then, he does keep a sleeping bag in his office and the restrooms in the offices also have shower facilities.
Indeed, if you work at the really big high tech firms like Microsoft, Cisco, Yahoo!, etc., most of them usually have a built in cafeteria, a constantly-restocked supply of soft drinks, and definitely got to have shower facilities for those folks who sometimes do all-nighters but of course want to keep up their personal hygiene.
Given you work at home, of course that's a different story; you have the bedroom and bathroom nearby, not to mention an obvious supply of food.
About time that Intel figured out what to do with that Red Hat Software investment. A "Net appliance" running a smaller version of Red Hat Linux 6.1 and Netscape Communicator 5.0 (based on Mozilla M12 technology) will be just the thing for people who aren't so computer-literate to get onto the Internet.
Now, if Intel can put in a 10/100Base-T Ethernet connection so you can plug in broadband Internet boxes for ADSL or cable modems and you're all set! The addition of a couple of USB ports means the "Net appliance" can also hook up to printers, keyboards, and mouse pointers also.
I think the author of Help Desk might be suffering from a nasty case of "political correctness."
I mean, in 1999 a show like ALL IN THE FAMILY would never have been approved for airing. Archie Bunker's rants would have gotten the network sued by every political group except the kitchen sink. (shrug)
Rush Hudson Limbaugh III (love him or not) is definitely correct in this sense: we have essentially lost the ability to laugh at ourselves. Remember the self-deprecating humor from Jewish comics from the first half of this century? We have replaced that with nasty invectives that if any person says the "politically incorrect" thing they get condemned--or worse. Think of Atlanta Braves closer John Rocker's joking comments in Sports Illustrated magazine, which may end up costing him his career in professional sports.
In short, people--no thanks to the "politically correct" movement--have lost their sense of humor and replaced it with nasty sniping back and forth that will one of these days lead to armed clash from both sides--the "Balkanization" of the country.
I hate to sound like this, but consider this: Windows makes up something like 85% of the desktop user base in the world right now.
Because of that, it's obvious that Citibank is going to go after that market first. Given that Internet Explorer 4.0x and later and Netscape Communicator 4.06 and later for Windows 95/98/NT4 should work with Citibank's new site, that will cover the vast majority of potential customers for this service.
Anyway, once Netscape Communicator 5.0 ships some time in 2000, this will no longer be an issue, since Communicator 5.0--based on Mozilla technology--should in theory work with Citibank's new site with no problems.
Boy, was I glad that the injunction didn't come down.
As I said earlier, if the injunction was enforced, the consequences could have been too ugly to contemplate. It could have given the DVD CCA lawyers carte blanche to start going after individual web sites with a vengence, and its effects on Slashdot.org could have been a bit on the terrifying side.
Given the unfortunate experience of the Church of Scientology versus several web sites and the etoy.com versus eToys.com controversy, I was extremely concerned what could have happened to Slashdot.org if the injunction went into force.
What I was trying to say (and people seemed to not get it) is that the LAST thing you want to do is make remarks that will be used as evidence by the opposition in a court of law against you. People forget one aspect of the "Miranda rights,"--namely that what you say or write can be used in a court of law against you.
If the plaintiffs in this case had gotten their injunction, they could have used the postings on Slashdot.org as proof that this site should be shut down at once in violation of the injunction. Now, the consequences of this potential action are too ugly to contemplate, to say the least.
Fortunately, the injunction did NOT come to pass. Saves way too many people lots of grief and reaching for antiacids. (smile)
Given the ugly situation of etoy.com versus eToys.com, it's just good prudence to "don't say anything that will aid the enemy" until there is some reasonable decision. I was very concerned if the injunction did take effect the plaintiffs could literally ask for a court order against Andover.net, and let's just say the potential consequences could be too ugly to contemplate.
In short, there's a lot of responsibility when it comes to the Bill of Rights.
I hate to rain on your parade, but if the court rules against the you, it could get very ugly very fast.
I would be very careful in any open comments on this issue, especially since lawyers representating the plaintiffs could be reading Slashdot.org. Any potentially damaging and/or slanderous comments could get the plaintiffs to ask for a court order for NSI to pull the registration of http://slashdot.org, and THAT will obviously have extremely ugly consequences.
In short, hope for the best, but don't do anything online here that will make a bad situation worse.
I'll say that RealNetworks dodged a major bullet over this one.
If Yahoo! Broadcast.com had dropped RealPlayer support, that could have been a deadly blow against Real. That's because by far, it is the most popular site for streaming media on the Internet, and losing the support of Broadcast.com would have dramatically reduced the demand for Real's products.
Why do I have this feeling that RealNetworks cut a very sweetheart deal for streaming media servers that supports the Real G2 format?
Having heard both the Mass in B Minor and the St. Matthew Passion, I do agreee that both have the merits. Both works are considered among the greatest musical works ever written, right up there with Beethoven's symphonies.
What is so impressive about Bach's music is that it lends itself to be adapted for almost any musical instrument out there. For example, the Toccata and Fugue in D Minor still maintains its majesty whether you hear it in the pipe organ original, the orchestral version done for the movie FANTASIA in 1940, or the few versions done for modern electronic synthesizers in recent years. Now THAT'S proof that Bach had musical genius.
Johann Sebestian Bach's legacy is more than just great music--he literally helped create greatness in many forms of music.
Because he came from a family of musicians, J.S. Bach could write just about everything from minute-long "inventions" all the way to major works like the Mass in B Minor, perhaps the greatest piece of religious music ever written.
Another legacy of J.S. Bach is the fact he mastered the use of so many types of musical instruments and musician arrangements, from the harpsicord, clavicord, the first pianos, to pipe organs, to string quartets, full orchestras, and even full-blown orchestras with a large choir. It is that amazing adaptability that we realized in the our century when Wendy Carlos used the early Moog synthesizers to create one of the MOST revolutionary recordings of all time, SWITCHED-ON BACH. When SWITCH-ON BACH came out in 1968, people were totally floored at how electronic synthesizers--then thought of as toys for "experimental" music--made the music of J.S. Bach so fresh and contemporary sounding. At one point, SWITCHED-ON BACH was selling faster than rock albums!
Even today, modern musicians are finding that modern musical instruments still can't diminish the amazing achievements of J.S. Bach. In short, Johann Sebestian Bach is truly the greatest composer of the last millennium.
The winner for the Person of the Millenium: Johan Gutenberg.
Gutenberg--by creating the low-cost hot-metal movable-type printing press--caused an explosion of knowledge that literally overturned Europe and eventually the world.
Before Gutenberg's time, information was either handed down orally or hand written in an extremely laborious manner. Gutenberg's invention allowed not just a few copies, but thousands of copies of books to be created in a very short period of time. It allowed the dissemination of religious, philosophical and scientific knowledge on a scale previously unheard of.
Through the printing press, scientific knowledge thought lost from ancient Greek and Roman scientists were rediscovered, along with new scientific knowledge from the Arabs. We also rediscovered the ancient philosophers and their ideals.
It also set into place the revolution that was to change religion in Europe: Martin Luther's famous Ninety-Five Theses would have stayed a curiosity but for the fact that his comments spread like wildfire thanks to the printing press.
It's only with the development of the World Wide Web by Tim Berners-Lee in 1989 that we have an invention that rivals the influence Gutenberg's printing press has on the world.
I think some people here on Slashdot have expressed their surprise at TIME's selection of Albert Einstein as Person of the Century.
What is interesting is that TIME had three final candidates (probably a week ago): Albert Einstein, Franklin Delano Roosevelt, and Mahatma Gandhi. Roosevelt was perhaps the most influential US President of this century, a leader that created our modern welfare system during the Great Depression and led our country through most of World War II. Mahatma Gandhi was the leader that preached non-violent civil disobedience and was instrumental in getting independence for India.
TIME probably did not choose FDR or Gandhi because their influence were mostly domestic--their influence during their primes were confined to the United States and India.
But Einstein's contributions to modern science are incalculable: the Special and General theories of relativity paved the way for most of the scientific research of this century. The fields of atomic energy, particle physics and electronics owe a huge debt to Einstein's work on relativity.
But yet, Einstein was a big dichotomy of sorts. He was a major pacifist, but yet was one of the signees on the letter that led to the creation of the Manhattan Project to build the atomic bomb. One wonders what kind of regrets he had late in his life for being a signee on that letter.
TIME chose Einstein because he best represents the modern scientific age that is the 20th Century, but also because Einstein often wondered with open regret the effects of modern science.
That's what happened LAST year at my brother's house when his wife's sisters and families showed up, not to mentioned my parents and me. That was quite a morning of opening Christmas presents, dogs running around and eating a bit too much for breakfast and dinner (burp).
What I find interesting is that you can get a LOT more progamming information on the format Microsoft uses for their streaming video system (the.ASF/.ASX formats are well-documented) than you can get for Real Networks'.ram/.rm file formats.
In fact, I would totally not be surprised at all if Microsoft would more than happy to help Linux programmers create a streaming video player for Windows Media.ASF/.ASX formats just to send Real Networks for a loop. Given the fact that Yahoo's Broadcast.com plans to switch to Windows Media format full-time, this could be bad news for Real Networks because RealPlayer is frequently used to listen to Broadcast.com streaming audio.
Slashdot Mirror
That's what YOU think.
Consider this for each Time-Warner division:
Warner Brothers is one of the largest studios in all of Hollywood, with movie production, TV production, animation production, plus its own TV network. Not to mention one of the largest film libraries in all of Hollywood.
Time, Inc. runs some extremely influential magazines: Time, Life, Sports Illustrated, Fortune, and others.
DC Comics has become a major influence in the comics industry. Their copyrighted properties are worth billions.
Turner Broadcasting owns CNN, CNN International, CNN Headline News, CNNsi, TNT and TBS Superstation.
HBO Networks owns HBO (through several channels) and Cinemax (through several channels), plus TVKO pay-per-view.
Time-Warner Cable owns 20% of all cable systems in the USA.
Warner Brothers Records (through its various labels) has a massive amount of recordings done per year.
When you combine the mass media power of Time-Warner with 21 million AOL subscribers, the result will be the most powerful mass media company in the world, no contest. This is frightening potential to stifle free speech as the AOL Time Warner conglomerate can shut out competitors in many entertainment markets.
The decision by American Online to buy ALL of Time-Warner has extremely frightening possibilities, to say the least.
The Time-Warner conglomerate already controls a large fraction of what we see on TV, hear on radio and read in magazines; add in AOL's huge online presence and they control a large portion of what we read on the Internet, too.
I think the FTC _may_ ask many questions about this, because of its severe anti-trust implications. It's like if Microsoft were to buy out either Symantec or Corel....
Don't forget Sluggy, too.
Sluggy is one of the very comics left (online or not) that is willing to do story arcs that lasts often for several months at a time.
If I remember it, when Bill Gaines was forced to change the format of MAD from a comic book to magazine format (no thanks to EC Comics being forced to close it comics line from public pressure in the middle 1950's), he hired a whole new group of artists to do the work in the new format. One of the best-known of that group was Don Martin, who was immediately popular for his quirky, "sick" humor style. The "Don Martin Looks At...." parodies are some of the very best work in the history of MAD.
What people frequently forget is that when MAD went from a comic book format to a magazine format in 1955, one of the first artists the late William Gaines hired was one Don Martin.
Martin's quirky (but very funny) style of cartoon work was truly unique and was a major mainstay at MAD until he had that unfortunate falling out with MAD back in 1988.
He will be seriously missed.
The biggest bottleneck is in three parts:
1. RAM size. People today should be running at bare minimum 64 MB, with 128 MB of RAM preferred. Even Linux users who run graphical environments like KDE or Gnome will benefit from 128 MB of RAM.
2. Get a MUCH faster hard drive. While SCSI is the preferable solution, it's still quite expensive to implement, mostly due to the higher cost of SCSI host adapter and UW/UW2-SCSI hard drives. If your operating system can take advantage of the PIIX4E Intel chipset implmentation, you can do bus-mastering on ATA-33/66 IDE hard drives, which lifts a big load off the CPU; in that case, a good 7200 RPM hard drive is a must.
3. Get a faster graphics card. If the new graphics card has drivers supported by the operating system, then you will get faster redraws everywhere (even beyond the 3-D graphics acceleration so much touted nowadays).
I have to ask just what kind of character support this "Red Flag Linux" is supposed to have. Will it be Simplified Chinese and/or Traditional Chinese?
Remember, Windows 2000 supports both Chinese character sets through Unicode, the international standard for foreign character sets. Unicode supports Latin, Cyrillic, both Chinese sets, Japanese, Hindi, Arabic, Hebrew, Thai and other character sets I don't remember offhand without having to do complicated changes to the OS just to change character displays.
Actually, what MacOS X ought to have is "predefined" desktop themes for people who have vision problems (it's similar to Windows' Accessibility Features configuration).
That way, with one mouse click older folks who have serious vision impairment can still read the MacOS screen without fiddling around with all those options in the MacOS Control Panel.
I think if you have read the authorized biography of William Henry Gates III (GATES by Stephen Manes and Paul Andrews), the mentality of programmers in 1975 to 1978 at Microsoft was come in at noon, program until 8 pm, go out for a meal at a fast food joint, then see a movie, then back for nocturnal coding until the wee hours, then home to crash and back again at noon to start the cycle all over again. Alas, that work, work and work mentality meant that personal hygiene and personal appearances were way down on the priority scale.
My brother (who works at a computer animation company) has done all-nighters, but then, he does keep a sleeping bag in his office and the restrooms in the offices also have shower facilities.
Indeed, if you work at the really big high tech firms like Microsoft, Cisco, Yahoo!, etc., most of them usually have a built in cafeteria, a constantly-restocked supply of soft drinks, and definitely got to have shower facilities for those folks who sometimes do all-nighters but of course want to keep up their personal hygiene.
Given you work at home, of course that's a different story; you have the bedroom and bathroom nearby, not to mention an obvious supply of food.
Actually, I agree 100%!
About time that Intel figured out what to do with that Red Hat Software investment. A "Net appliance" running a smaller version of Red Hat Linux 6.1 and Netscape Communicator 5.0 (based on Mozilla M12 technology) will be just the thing for people who aren't so computer-literate to get onto the Internet.
Now, if Intel can put in a 10/100Base-T Ethernet connection so you can plug in broadband Internet boxes for ADSL or cable modems and you're all set! The addition of a couple of USB ports means the "Net appliance" can also hook up to printers, keyboards, and mouse pointers also.
I think the author of Help Desk might be suffering from a nasty case of "political correctness."
I mean, in 1999 a show like ALL IN THE FAMILY would never have been approved for airing. Archie Bunker's rants would have gotten the network sued by every political group except the kitchen sink. (shrug)
Rush Hudson Limbaugh III (love him or not) is definitely correct in this sense: we have essentially lost the ability to laugh at ourselves. Remember the self-deprecating humor from Jewish comics from the first half of this century? We have replaced that with nasty invectives that if any person says the "politically incorrect" thing they get condemned--or worse. Think of Atlanta Braves closer John Rocker's joking comments in Sports Illustrated magazine, which may end up costing him his career in professional sports.
In short, people--no thanks to the "politically correct" movement--have lost their sense of humor and replaced it with nasty sniping back and forth that will one of these days lead to armed clash from both sides--the "Balkanization" of the country.
Folks,
I hate to sound like this, but consider this: Windows makes up something like 85% of the desktop user base in the world right now.
Because of that, it's obvious that Citibank is going to go after that market first. Given that Internet Explorer 4.0x and later and Netscape Communicator 4.06 and later for Windows 95/98/NT4 should work with Citibank's new site, that will cover the vast majority of potential customers for this service.
Anyway, once Netscape Communicator 5.0 ships some time in 2000, this will no longer be an issue, since Communicator 5.0--based on Mozilla technology--should in theory work with Citibank's new site with no problems.
Boy, was I glad that the injunction didn't come down.
As I said earlier, if the injunction was enforced, the consequences could have been too ugly to contemplate. It could have given the DVD CCA lawyers carte blanche to start going after individual web sites with a vengence, and its effects on Slashdot.org could have been a bit on the terrifying side.
Given the unfortunate experience of the Church of Scientology versus several web sites and the etoy.com versus eToys.com controversy, I was extremely concerned what could have happened to Slashdot.org if the injunction went into force.
Thank you very much for your statements!
What I was trying to say (and people seemed to not get it) is that the LAST thing you want to do is make remarks that will be used as evidence by the opposition in a court of law against you. People forget one aspect of the "Miranda rights,"--namely that what you say or write can be used in a court of law against you.
If the plaintiffs in this case had gotten their injunction, they could have used the postings on Slashdot.org as proof that this site should be shut down at once in violation of the injunction. Now, the consequences of this potential action are too ugly to contemplate, to say the least.
Ben,
Fortunately, the injunction did NOT come to pass. Saves way too many people lots of grief and reaching for antiacids. (smile)
Given the ugly situation of etoy.com versus eToys.com, it's just good prudence to "don't say anything that will aid the enemy" until there is some reasonable decision. I was very concerned if the injunction did take effect the plaintiffs could literally ask for a court order against Andover.net, and let's just say the potential consequences could be too ugly to contemplate.
In short, there's a lot of responsibility when it comes to the Bill of Rights.
Folks,
I hate to rain on your parade, but if the court rules against the you, it could get very ugly very fast.
I would be very careful in any open comments on this issue, especially since lawyers representating the plaintiffs could be reading Slashdot.org. Any potentially damaging and/or slanderous comments could get the plaintiffs to ask for a court order for NSI to pull the registration of http://slashdot.org, and THAT will obviously have extremely ugly consequences.
In short, hope for the best, but don't do anything online here that will make a bad situation worse.
I'll say that RealNetworks dodged a major bullet over this one.
If Yahoo! Broadcast.com had dropped RealPlayer support, that could have been a deadly blow against Real. That's because by far, it is the most popular site for streaming media on the Internet, and losing the support of Broadcast.com would have dramatically reduced the demand for Real's products.
Why do I have this feeling that RealNetworks cut a very sweetheart deal for streaming media servers that supports the Real G2 format?
I saw that "fan" site and it was utterly brilliant!!! (^_^)
The marketing people must have scrunged through every fan site on Yahoo! Geocities and Lycos Tripod to pull off this superb parody.
Having heard both the Mass in B Minor and the St. Matthew Passion, I do agreee that both have the merits. Both works are considered among the greatest musical works ever written, right up there with Beethoven's symphonies.
What is so impressive about Bach's music is that it lends itself to be adapted for almost any musical instrument out there. For example, the Toccata and Fugue in D Minor still maintains its majesty whether you hear it in the pipe organ original, the orchestral version done for the movie FANTASIA in 1940, or the few versions done for modern electronic synthesizers in recent years. Now THAT'S proof that Bach had musical genius.
Tom,
Johann Sebestian Bach's legacy is more than just great music--he literally helped create greatness in many forms of music.
Because he came from a family of musicians, J.S. Bach could write just about everything from minute-long "inventions" all the way to major works like the Mass in B Minor, perhaps the greatest piece of religious music ever written.
Another legacy of J.S. Bach is the fact he mastered the use of so many types of musical instruments and musician arrangements, from the harpsicord, clavicord, the first pianos, to pipe organs, to string quartets, full orchestras, and even full-blown orchestras with a large choir. It is that amazing adaptability that we realized in the our century when Wendy Carlos used the early Moog synthesizers to create one of the MOST revolutionary recordings of all time, SWITCHED-ON BACH. When SWITCH-ON BACH came out in 1968, people were totally floored at how electronic synthesizers--then thought of as toys for "experimental" music--made the music of J.S. Bach so fresh and contemporary sounding. At one point, SWITCHED-ON BACH was selling faster than rock albums!
Even today, modern musicians are finding that modern musical instruments still can't diminish the amazing achievements of J.S. Bach. In short, Johann Sebestian Bach is truly the greatest composer of the last millennium.
The winner for the Person of the Millenium: Johan Gutenberg.
Gutenberg--by creating the low-cost hot-metal movable-type printing press--caused an explosion of knowledge that literally overturned Europe and eventually the world.
Before Gutenberg's time, information was either handed down orally or hand written in an extremely laborious manner. Gutenberg's invention allowed not just a few copies, but thousands of copies of books to be created in a very short period of time. It allowed the dissemination of religious, philosophical and scientific knowledge on a scale previously unheard of.
Through the printing press, scientific knowledge thought lost from ancient Greek and Roman scientists were rediscovered, along with new scientific knowledge from the Arabs. We also rediscovered the ancient philosophers and their ideals.
It also set into place the revolution that was to change religion in Europe: Martin Luther's famous Ninety-Five Theses would have stayed a curiosity but for the fact that his comments spread like wildfire thanks to the printing press.
It's only with the development of the World Wide Web by Tim Berners-Lee in 1989 that we have an invention that rivals the influence Gutenberg's printing press has on the world.
I think some people here on Slashdot have expressed their surprise at TIME's selection of Albert Einstein as Person of the Century.
What is interesting is that TIME had three final candidates (probably a week ago): Albert Einstein, Franklin Delano Roosevelt, and Mahatma Gandhi. Roosevelt was perhaps the most influential US President of this century, a leader that created our modern welfare system during the Great Depression and led our country through most of World War II. Mahatma Gandhi was the leader that preached non-violent civil disobedience and was instrumental in getting independence for India.
TIME probably did not choose FDR or Gandhi because their influence were mostly domestic--their influence during their primes were confined to the United States and India.
But Einstein's contributions to modern science are incalculable: the Special and General theories of relativity paved the way for most of the scientific research of this century. The fields of atomic energy, particle physics and electronics owe a huge debt to Einstein's work on relativity.
But yet, Einstein was a big dichotomy of sorts. He was a major pacifist, but yet was one of the signees on the letter that led to the creation of the Manhattan Project to build the atomic bomb. One wonders what kind of regrets he had late in his life for being a signee on that letter.
TIME chose Einstein because he best represents the modern scientific age that is the 20th Century, but also because Einstein often wondered with open regret the effects of modern science.
To Rob Malda, Jon Katz, Hemos and other people I don't remember who maintain Slashdot.org:
Merry Christmas (may it be joyful), and have a Happy New Year 2000!
Hopefully, when the Linux 2.4.x kernel is ready in a few months, Linux will finally get the mainstream success on the desktop it deserves.
That's what happened LAST year at my brother's house when his wife's sisters and families showed up, not to mentioned my parents and me. That was quite a morning of opening Christmas presents, dogs running around and eating a bit too much for breakfast and dinner (burp).
Hope your holiday season is happy.
What I find interesting is that you can get a LOT more progamming information on the format Microsoft uses for their streaming video system (the .ASF/.ASX formats are well-documented) than you can get for Real Networks' .ram/.rm file formats.
.ASF/.ASX formats just to send Real Networks for a loop. Given the fact that Yahoo's Broadcast.com plans to switch to Windows Media format full-time, this could be bad news for Real Networks because RealPlayer is frequently used to listen to Broadcast.com streaming audio.
In fact, I would totally not be surprised at all if Microsoft would more than happy to help Linux programmers create a streaming video player for Windows Media