'cause I'm not going to annotate the whole stupid thing.
Incidentally, I'm viewing this in Adobe Acrobat Reader for Linux x86.;)
OF COURSE the breakup is going to change their pricing structure. Competition generally drives prices *lower*.
Please tell me what Microsoft's 'low price strategy' is. They sell Windows and Office separately now anyhow.
How could the Windows software environment *possibly* be less predictable?
Please give examples of any actual "Microsoft Innovation" that doesn't involve buying other companies.
No one would pay $800 for an OS when they can pay that for a computer now.
Prices dropped for Word Processors and Spreadsheets due to competition; everyone made them, and they came standard with a computer. Later, we get unfair competition: I never paid for MS-Works, back in the day; it was bundled. And a lot of companies went out of business, or disappeared.
Corel hasn't been solvent for a long time; it has nothing to do with their recent plans, which are quite good. They've just been leaking money.
You can already do everything low-level in Word BASIC. I move that it be considered part of the OS, and removed from Office, and preferably the Universe as well.
Ever hear of MySQL? It's free...
If AppCo becomes a competitor to OpCo... well, maybe they'll get broken up again. I was hoping for a 'Networking' division, too.
A game console really shouldn't have an OS, but that's completely separate from the hardware, since that stuff should be on the cartridge. Also, different gaming companies should be free to use it or not.
"Lower Quality Windows OS"? Bwahaha...
It genuinely scares me when paper-pushers think Microsoft==Computers==Innovation. Nothing could be further than the truth.
I give up. Lies, Damn Lies, and Statistics.
Since I don't consider this a serious debate, I haven't outlined all my points clearly, but if you wish to debate, pick a point and I will elaborate. I think this whole thing is incredibly pathetic, though. --- pb Reply or e-mail; don't vaguely moderate.
"market leaders as Intuit, Symantec, Lotus, Adobe, or Quark"
Intuit:Quicken runs fine on Linux, a la Corel. (if Corel's Office Suite runs under Linux, so does Quicken, it's just not official...)
Symantec & Lotus: They already sold out, or have been crushed by Microsoft. Much more worrisome.
Adobe: They dropped all Unix support in Photoshop 3.x, even though the Windows version of Photoshop 3.0 runs just fine on Linux; see Intuit. Besides, we also have The Gimp.
Quark: Aren't you doing that on a Mac anyhow? Heck, if I had LinuxPPC, I might be able to get that working, too. There are alternatives, too, not that I'd ever want to use, say, Interleaf, but TeX is rather well known; people write books in it. --- pb Reply or e-mail; don't vaguely moderate.
I doubt this is what usually happens, and it's probably more than offset by the number of bozos who just realized that their degree in Ancient Sumerian won't get them a job, but I doubt those bozos are necessarily highly qualified at first. (read: "Certification Programs")
However, it does happen. --- pb Reply or e-mail; don't vaguely moderate.
Instead of a shortage, it's more of an inability to keep people; that's one reason why it's so easy to get temp work.
Read the paper and check out the ads sometime; they have totally unreasonable expectations of what skill-sets they expect people to have. Just going through college is not enough; you can graduate from mine with a degree in Computer Science, and never learn C if you're careful, just Java, assembler, and maybe a functional language and something else, like SQL.
But then you don't have seven years experience in web design, or five years experience in Java, or a working knowledge of RPG, or something else equally ludicrous.
Of course, these requirements are padded, as are most people's credentials; but I'd much rather people said what they meant and were honest about the job requirements and the work environment. Lying to prospective employees is not a good way to start anything. --- pb Reply or e-mail; don't vaguely moderate.
A lot of people are saying that this is somehow new or different than the 3-D printing technology we've already heard about.
It's not.
I saw this years and years ago in Wired in the Fetish section, back when Wired was somewhat fun to read. Yes, it scanned, assembled, and built the parts, and colored them too.
The difference is, now it's cheaper. Well, so is the computer on my desktop; I could have gotten the same computing power back then, but it would have cost exponentially more.
But apparently both of these are news on slashdot: "Old tech cheaper now"=="Moore's Law Still Sorta Works", and whatnot... --- pb Reply or e-mail; don't vaguely moderate.
Well, we could hold a constitutional convention, and *then* vote them off the island. But it shouldn't take longer than a day to reverse it, it'll just take longer than a day to get it all together.
Hey, everything I'm doing is legal. It's just all steganographically encoded in slashdot from about 8 accounts. That's needed, because the data loss is pretty high, but that's the price you pay for security these days.
I'm not afraid to mention that here because I'm not saying which 8 accounts, but they just post random gibberish-looking posts which have a tendency to get modded up for no reason. Oh, and some articles, too, but not that many people like the articles. Gotta get "post-Columbine" out of my wordlist before more people complain. --- pb Reply or e-mail; don't vaguely moderate.
Real cloak-and-dagger style recon there, guys; cool!
Of course security professionals and people who have worked on these sorts of projects would be the best able to understand the issues involved. In this case, though, they're also the most likely ones to have conflicts of interest. I say, since this is a democracy and all, that we start voting them off the island and get a new group in there, pronto... --- pb Reply or e-mail; don't vaguely moderate.
Actually, that *is* a big deal. I'm pretty thankful for Mae West, and I don't mean the actress.
However, what I'd really want is faster international traffic, especially to Britain, Japan, Germany... well, anywhere slow, really.:)
However, it's probably better to look into massive distributed caching models for that first, considering how much that sort of bandwidth costs. --- pb Reply or e-mail; don't vaguely moderate.
=20
A FINFLASH FROM THE FREEDOM TO INNOVATE NETWORK!
September 26, 2000
To cancel your subscription to this newsletter or stop all=20
newsletters from microsoft.com, read the directions at the=20
bottom of this message.
SUPREME COURT REJECTS DOJ REQUEST TO BYPASS DC APPEALS COURT =20
On Tuesday, September 26, the U.S. Supreme Court rejected the=20
government's request to hear Microsoft=92s appeal in the Department=20
of Justice antitrust case against the company, and announced=20
its decision to send it instead directly to the U.S. Court of=20
Appeals.=20
The DC Court of Appeals previously announced that if the Supreme=20
Court sent the case to them, Microsoft=92s appeal would be heard =20
"en banc" -- which means by the entire panel of Appeals Court=20
judges (other than those who have recused themselves).
Microsoft is confident of its case on appeal, which will outline=20
a significant number of legal, factual and procedural errors=20
committed in the district court. Microsoft believes the district=20
court=92s ruling will be reversed, and that it is in the best=20
interests of the company, its customers and the entire industry=20
to put the issue behind us.
=20
The next step is for Microsoft to file its recommended briefing=20
schedule on Monday, October 2. The government will respond on=20
October 5, with Microsoft=92s reply due October 10.
If you would like to let your elected officials know what you think=20
about today=92s decision, or if you just want to stay up to date on=20
developments in the antitrust trial, visit the Freedom to Innovate=20
Network at http://www.microsoft.com/freedomtoinnovate .
The *only* good line from an unspeakable space movie had something to do with trusting your lives to billions of parts all made by the lowest bidder...
...sounds like the Mickey Mouse route to me, especially with what NASA's budget is these days. --- pb Reply or e-mail; don't vaguely moderate.
Although I'll stick to "never trust anyone over 2^10, for obvious reasons"...:)
But talk about a stupid issue; since we were both around before we had UIDs, it doesn't matter at all. Although I'm glad I don't have to type in my contact info every time.
I remember when one new user thought that "BoredAtWork" was an Anonymous Coward-type account (i.e. a generic name assigned by the system if you don't give it a name) because he posted so #@*& much back then. But he's UID #36, so of course he doesn't post much now. His posts are still excellent, though.
And yes, it's the old users who get fed up with the system and turn to trolling, because the system encourages it. But don't even get me started on that one... --- pb Reply or e-mail; don't vaguely moderate.
I've heard the same complaints about them, but I haven't tried their product (for obvious reasons).
I also have a dualhead, but I haven't gotten to try it out yet. I guess I'll suffer through trying to do it with XFree, but I'm pretty sure that it's supported... --- pb Reply or e-mail; don't vaguely moderate.
Slashdot Mirror
'cause I'm not going to annotate the whole stupid thing.
;)
Incidentally, I'm viewing this in Adobe Acrobat Reader for Linux x86.
OF COURSE the breakup is going to change their pricing structure. Competition generally drives prices *lower*.
Please tell me what Microsoft's 'low price strategy' is. They sell Windows and Office separately now anyhow.
How could the Windows software environment *possibly* be less predictable?
Please give examples of any actual "Microsoft Innovation" that doesn't involve buying other companies.
No one would pay $800 for an OS when they can pay that for a computer now.
Prices dropped for Word Processors and Spreadsheets due to competition; everyone made them, and they came standard with a computer. Later, we get unfair competition: I never paid for MS-Works, back in the day; it was bundled. And a lot of companies went out of business, or disappeared.
Corel hasn't been solvent for a long time; it has nothing to do with their recent plans, which are quite good. They've just been leaking money.
You can already do everything low-level in Word BASIC. I move that it be considered part of the OS, and removed from Office, and preferably the Universe as well.
Ever hear of MySQL? It's free...
If AppCo becomes a competitor to OpCo... well, maybe they'll get broken up again. I was hoping for a 'Networking' division, too.
A game console really shouldn't have an OS, but that's completely separate from the hardware, since that stuff should be on the cartridge. Also, different gaming companies should be free to use it or not.
"Lower Quality Windows OS"? Bwahaha...
It genuinely scares me when paper-pushers think Microsoft==Computers==Innovation. Nothing could be further than the truth.
I give up. Lies, Damn Lies, and Statistics.
Since I don't consider this a serious debate, I haven't outlined all my points clearly, but if you wish to debate, pick a point and I will elaborate. I think this whole thing is incredibly pathetic, though.
---
pb Reply or e-mail; don't vaguely moderate.
"market leaders as Intuit, Symantec, Lotus, Adobe, or Quark"
Intuit:Quicken runs fine on Linux, a la Corel. (if Corel's Office Suite runs under Linux, so does Quicken, it's just not official...)
Symantec & Lotus: They already sold out, or have been crushed by Microsoft. Much more worrisome.
Adobe: They dropped all Unix support in Photoshop 3.x, even though the Windows version of Photoshop 3.0 runs just fine on Linux; see Intuit. Besides, we also have The Gimp.
Quark: Aren't you doing that on a Mac anyhow? Heck, if I had LinuxPPC, I might be able to get that working, too. There are alternatives, too, not that I'd ever want to use, say, Interleaf, but TeX is rather well known; people write books in it.
---
pb Reply or e-mail; don't vaguely moderate.
No, you're thinking of SGML.
---
pb Reply or e-mail; don't vaguely moderate.
I believe jwz is running a nightclub...
I doubt this is what usually happens, and it's probably more than offset by the number of bozos who just realized that their degree in Ancient Sumerian won't get them a job, but I doubt those bozos are necessarily highly qualified at first. (read: "Certification Programs")
However, it does happen.
---
pb Reply or e-mail; don't vaguely moderate.
Instead of a shortage, it's more of an inability to keep people; that's one reason why it's so easy to get temp work.
Read the paper and check out the ads sometime; they have totally unreasonable expectations of what skill-sets they expect people to have. Just going through college is not enough; you can graduate from mine with a degree in Computer Science, and never learn C if you're careful, just Java, assembler, and maybe a functional language and something else, like SQL.
But then you don't have seven years experience in web design, or five years experience in Java, or a working knowledge of RPG, or something else equally ludicrous.
Of course, these requirements are padded, as are most people's credentials; but I'd much rather people said what they meant and were honest about the job requirements and the work environment. Lying to prospective employees is not a good way to start anything.
---
pb Reply or e-mail; don't vaguely moderate.
A lot of people are saying that this is somehow new or different than the 3-D printing technology we've already heard about.
It's not.
I saw this years and years ago in Wired in the Fetish section, back when Wired was somewhat fun to read. Yes, it scanned, assembled, and built the parts, and colored them too.
The difference is, now it's cheaper. Well, so is the computer on my desktop; I could have gotten the same computing power back then, but it would have cost exponentially more.
But apparently both of these are news on slashdot: "Old tech cheaper now"=="Moore's Law Still Sorta Works", and whatnot...
---
pb Reply or e-mail; don't vaguely moderate.
Well, we could hold a constitutional convention, and *then* vote them off the island. But it shouldn't take longer than a day to reverse it, it'll just take longer than a day to get it all together.
Hey, everything I'm doing is legal. It's just all steganographically encoded in slashdot from about 8 accounts. That's needed, because the data loss is pretty high, but that's the price you pay for security these days.
I'm not afraid to mention that here because I'm not saying which 8 accounts, but they just post random gibberish-looking posts which have a tendency to get modded up for no reason. Oh, and some articles, too, but not that many people like the articles. Gotta get "post-Columbine" out of my wordlist before more people complain.
---
pb Reply or e-mail; don't vaguely moderate.
Real cloak-and-dagger style recon there, guys; cool!
Of course security professionals and people who have worked on these sorts of projects would be the best able to understand the issues involved. In this case, though, they're also the most likely ones to have conflicts of interest. I say, since this is a democracy and all, that we start voting them off the island and get a new group in there, pronto...
---
pb Reply or e-mail; don't vaguely moderate.
A little searching revealed these babies; they're U2, and it looks like they do AGP.
---
pb Reply or e-mail; don't vaguely moderate.
Actually, that *is* a big deal. I'm pretty thankful for Mae West, and I don't mean the actress.
:)
However, what I'd really want is faster international traffic, especially to Britain, Japan, Germany... well, anywhere slow, really.
However, it's probably better to look into massive distributed caching models for that first, considering how much that sort of bandwidth costs.
---
pb Reply or e-mail; don't vaguely moderate.
Indeed; piss off, peons. ;)
---
pb Reply or e-mail; don't vaguely moderate.
I didn't want to see any more articles about the RIAA today!
---
pb Reply or e-mail; don't vaguely moderate.
I was wondering the same thing, since I never signed up for this either.
And looking at how their e-mail comes out from elm, well, if that's innovation, then I don't want any.
---
pb Reply or e-mail; don't vaguely moderate.
Well, maybe I should be more specific: until they unify AIM and ICQ, and release it for Linux without ads.
I know what they already have available, and I don't want it, because I don't want to run two clients.
---
pb Reply or e-mail; don't vaguely moderate.
*ROFL*
I couldn't have said it better...
---
pb Reply or e-mail; don't vaguely moderate.
Random ugly microsoft spam:
From MSFin@microsoft.com Wed Sep 27 00:09:02 2000
Date: Tue, 26 Sep 2000 21:04:03 -0700
Subject: A FINFLASH FROM THE FREEDOM TO INNOVATE NETWORK
Reply-To: MSFin@microsoft.com
X-Mailer: MT Mail ver. 1.22.2
MIME-Version: 1.0
Content-Type: multipart/mixed; boundary="PART.BOUNDARY.970028117"
X-UIDL: 1ea40d45cac410d3b081b3f1bc623b00
Status: ORU
> This is a message in 'MIME' format.
> If your mail reader does not support MIME
> you may not be able to read some parts of this message.
--PART.BOUNDARY.970028117
Content-Type: text/plain; charset=iso-8859-1
Content-Transfer-Encoding: quoted-printable
=20
A FINFLASH FROM THE FREEDOM TO INNOVATE NETWORK!
September 26, 2000
To cancel your subscription to this newsletter or stop all=20
newsletters from microsoft.com, read the directions at the=20
bottom of this message.
SUPREME COURT REJECTS DOJ REQUEST TO BYPASS DC APPEALS COURT =20
On Tuesday, September 26, the U.S. Supreme Court rejected the=20
government's request to hear Microsoft=92s appeal in the Department=20
of Justice antitrust case against the company, and announced=20
its decision to send it instead directly to the U.S. Court of=20
Appeals.=20
The DC Court of Appeals previously announced that if the Supreme=20
Court sent the case to them, Microsoft=92s appeal would be heard =20
"en banc" -- which means by the entire panel of Appeals Court=20
judges (other than those who have recused themselves).
Microsoft is confident of its case on appeal, which will outline=20
a significant number of legal, factual and procedural errors=20
committed in the district court. Microsoft believes the district=20
court=92s ruling will be reversed, and that it is in the best=20
interests of the company, its customers and the entire industry=20
to put the issue behind us.
=20
The next step is for Microsoft to file its recommended briefing=20
schedule on Monday, October 2. The government will respond on=20
October 5, with Microsoft=92s reply due October 10.
If you would like to let your elected officials know what you think=20
about today=92s decision, or if you just want to stay up to date on=20
developments in the antitrust trial, visit the Freedom to Innovate=20
Network at http://www.microsoft.com/freedomtoinnovate .
---
pb Reply or e-mail; don't vaguely moderate.
Who marked that as overrated? I'm still snickering...
Unfortunately, I'm signed up for AIM and ICQ so I can talk to my friends outside of the Realm, so it'd be awfully cramped in there.
Can we check which client they're using before we stash them in the cave?
---
pb Reply or e-mail; don't vaguely moderate.
Not this time, AC! I post all my goatse.cx links at +2 so they're easy for you to find! :)
Hey, what's your ICQ number?
---
pb Reply or e-mail; don't vaguely moderate.
...but until that happens, and they release a Linux version without ads, there's always Everybuddy.
In any case, I'll always be in favor of a universal, free client; I haven't tried Jabber lately.
---
pb Reply or e-mail; don't vaguely moderate.
Good call.
You can take our karma, but you can't break our spirit!
Signed,
The Slashdoterrati
---
pb Reply or e-mail; don't vaguely moderate.
The *only* good line from an unspeakable space movie had something to do with trusting your lives to billions of parts all made by the lowest bidder...
...sounds like the Mickey Mouse route to me, especially with what NASA's budget is these days.
---
pb Reply or e-mail; don't vaguely moderate.
Tell me if you get it working; I haven't tried QNX at all.
Sure, let's move to there...
---
pb Reply or e-mail; don't vaguely moderate.
You're completely right, my man.
:)
Although I'll stick to "never trust anyone over 2^10, for obvious reasons"...
But talk about a stupid issue; since we were both around before we had UIDs, it doesn't matter at all. Although I'm glad I don't have to type in my contact info every time.
I remember when one new user thought that "BoredAtWork" was an Anonymous Coward-type account (i.e. a generic name assigned by the system if you don't give it a name) because he posted so #@*& much back then. But he's UID #36, so of course he doesn't post much now. His posts are still excellent, though.
And yes, it's the old users who get fed up with the system and turn to trolling, because the system encourages it. But don't even get me started on that one...
---
pb Reply or e-mail; don't vaguely moderate.
Apparently not...
Slashdot is just useless these days.
So what's up?
---
pb Reply or e-mail; don't vaguely moderate.
I've heard the same complaints about them, but I haven't tried their product (for obvious reasons).
I also have a dualhead, but I haven't gotten to try it out yet. I guess I'll suffer through trying to do it with XFree, but I'm pretty sure that it's supported...
---
pb Reply or e-mail; don't vaguely moderate.