Well, if they have 10% of their workforce drawing a paycheck, but don't have any work to bill against, then I'd say there is no problem in laying off 10%. I doubt it will fix any mess, but it will prevent having to pay people that aren't doing any work.
What drives me crazy is the notion that a business is "failing" if they do anything but get bigger and bigger year after year. Is the goal of a business to take over the world, or to provide goods/services?
I can't speak for original, but "better" to me exists REGARDLESS of price. The price of something is totally irrelevant to how well something works. As stated, Intel just makes a better processor at the moment.
The article implies that the most layoffs will be in Germany, so I'm not sure what long term impact that would have on the "whole economy". I'm not one to poo poo job losses, but the sky definitely ISN'T falling (yet), especially if you check out the new AMD Campus here in Austin.
Gee, a study that says 40% of us are paranoid, then this article gets posted as newsworthy ( and with the tag "privacy" ).
I used to think slashdot was a site about technology but now days it's just a bunch of paranoid conspiracy theorists worried about stuff that isn't happening, at the same time complaining about the Bush administration's culture of Fear.
Well now that he's still saying nice things about Microsoft but no longer works for them, I think he's definitely a shill. He definitely is demonstrating more restraint than I ever could.
"Uhh"...Not for the past ten years have I seen "flickering" windows on a Mac (maybe the exception being OSX beta). It's been about 10 minutes since my XP box did that.
I call BULL. A MacBook Pro has tons more graphic power than my MacBook, and my MacBook doesn't do it. My 8-year old G4 doesn't do it (even with only 768mb ram, stock ATI video card, while driving two 18" CRTs).
Don't forget, Apple has about a five year head-start on having windows that actually show the content when you move them around. It seems like Microsoft was in love with just showing the frame of the window until a just a couple of years ago.
One of them is that I'm really uncomfortable associating with religious zealots. So you don't like Linux and Ron Paul?
Seriously, I hate this attitude, and it says more about your own insecurities than it does the reality of MOST Mac users. I'm almost starting to understand what it must be like to be the victim of racism, given the attitudes people hold about me, because I use a Mac, without even knowing me.
No, I'm 38 and I had a Vic-20. I think my Atari 800 was my third computer, but then again, so friggin' what.
System 6 and my Mac Plus WERE the infancy state of the current paradigm of personal computing, not Commodore 64s, not Atari 800s, hell, not even those amber/green IBMs. If YOU are older than 12 (what the hell does a stupid personal attack like that have to do with anything?), you'd have to admit that computer technology changed by the week back then. One day my firm was using little black and white Mac Plusses, then the next day I was doing full color two page layout with a Mac IIfx. The day after that, I was on the Internets through some cool thing called Prodigy.
Now if you'd like to discuss how the System 6 to System 7 transition was so bad instead of making bad guesses at my age, I'm all ears.
Your memory is different than mine. Going from 6 to 7 was how many years ago? For the time of the transition and given the relative infancy of personal computing, it was pretty smooth. I can't actually remember ANYTHING about that transition, except for some stability problems with 7.5 (or maybe it was 7.6?)
The only thing making the switch to PPC chips painful was that the CPUs got so fast so quickly, they rendered any chip more than a year old obsolete, regardless of its underlying architecture. I don't recall any application actually not working after switching to a PPC.
I had ZERO broken apps in the 9-OSX transition. The only problem in the entire switch over came years later when they never made an OSX version of Myth and Myth II, and my current Macs can no longer run OS9. Since both those games were hybrid PCs, I can actually play them on my Intel Mac (in PC mode). So yeah, kudos to Microsoft for maintaining backwards compatibility for my desire to play an obsolete game.
Microsoft has the ability to make a platform that's much more friendly to developers and users alike. Rightly or wrongly, I am of the opinion that being friendly to developers AND users is mutually exclusive. The entire "process-vs.-product" mentality is the fundamental reason we have Mac vs. PC arguments in the first place. They do the same thing, but go at it with two different world-views in mind. What I think your statement should say to better represent reality, is that Microsoft has made a system that is developer-centric and Apple has focused on the user experience at the expense of a robust development environment. I'm not stating either way is better, just different (with different results, obviously).
This could mean that the Administration believes the NSA's warrantless wiretapping and data mining programs are not governed by the Constitution.. Or it also could NOT mean they believe something. Quit interjecting opinion disguised as fact.
Wow. If you re-read your entry (the sad commentary that it is), you'll probably notice that it says more about YOU than it does Apple, Inc. This is also an unfortunate all-too-frequent attitude that I just don't get. It's a computer, deal with it. If you don't like it, use a different one. I bet you hate people who drive BMWs too, or who live in nice big houses, eh?
Uh, your link separates MacIntel from Mac OS. What in the hell does that mean? Intel Macs running OSX vs. PPC Macs running OSX? If that's the case, then it should just be one combined number, since they are using the same OS and it is a chart about OS use, not hardware use. In any case, let's have this conversation again in about five years.
Well stated. Microsoft isn't evil because they are big. They are evil because their products suck. That probably has a lot to do with the fact they are big, though, so in a round-a-bout way, I guess they are evil because they are big.
If "everyone knows how to use" Microsoft operating systems, yet they STILL work as poorly as they do, I guess the "blame the user" excuse is out the window? What does this imply about the quality of Windows, if everyone knows how to use it, yet there are still so many problems?
A public company has exactly 1 consistent goal--to make money for its shareholders. This is the worst cliche of my lifetime. The reason companies like Apple can stand out (or be called niche, if you must) is because their vision extends beyond the narrow focus of "making money for shareholders". There are plenty of companies with different motivations OTHER than the bottom line. Apple's happens to be "make great products and everything else takes care of its self". If you want to support a bottom-line organizations like Dell and Microsoft, you get what you pay for: mediocrity.
Windows: plug in the drive, wait through a few 'recognized a new device' dialogs, double-click to open it, and drag the files from it. Then unmount it from the task bar and walk off.
Mac: plug in the drive, double-click to open it, and drag the files from it. Then unmount it from Finder and walk off.
What is the difference?
It's a shame this is an old thread and nobody will see my response.
The difference(s) are: with Windows, you plug in the drive and "hope" that you see "new device recognized". In more times than I care to recall, the most recently being an embarrassing moment I tried to demonstrate my company's USB fingerprint reader, the device I plug into WinXP isn't recognized, or isn't working properly due to some driver issue. With a Mac, an icon of the actual device shows up on your desktop, with no need to "assure" the user that the "new device" is working properly via "a few dialogues", and definitely no annoying driver issues.
Then there's the whole issue of Windows starting to copy files across drives and not telling you there isn't enough space on the target drive until you've gotten 75% of the way done and have wasted several minutes. With OSX, it tells you right up front that there isn't enough space.
Finally, I know it always says not to, but with OSX I've never lost a single bit of data by unplugging a device without "unmounting" it first. I can't say the same for WinXP.
So to the casual observer, yeah, they do the same thing, but the refinement in the way OSX goes about it seems to be lost on most casual observers.
There are probably a million creative professionals right now that would like to line you up and smack you for your ignorance. Are you implying that firewire sucks and USB2 is the better alternative? Maybe I miss your point? Can you actually defend your statement with any sort of technical logic? For all I've read in the past 10 years, there's a technical reason firewire is THE standard used for digital video and another opposite reason why USB2 isn't.
As long as Apple keeps their corporate culture alive and doesn't succomb to the disease of the big-business, design-by-committee, process-driven business models of Microsoft and others, then Apple will always be a favorite (and yes, the underdog, and yes, the niche market). Huge corporate successes will imply that Apple has indeed sold out and, by definition, not be as good as they are now.
Seems pretty simple to me. Beautiful job in making his point for him. The fact that this discussion has hundreds of comments pretty much ensures this isn't the cut-and-dry issue that the "Mac suxorz", "pwned" and "haha tag" crowds think it is.
Off topic, but I'll chime in. I use Safari primarily, with Firefox and Camino (less-and-less these days). Safari is faster and more stable; as in rock-solid stable...as in never crashes. I keep going back to Firefox because Slashdot tells me I should, but after the third crash per day, I give up and go back to Safari. I find myself not worrying so much these days and just using Safari most of the time. I can't log into my work time-card with Safari though (stupid Microsoft) so I keep Firefox around. Camino is an interesting Mac-centric product, but come on, a browser is just a browser and I really don't see the need to hoard browsers.
I'm not him, but agree with him. I've noticed that the reaction of this entire thread has been on the fact they hacked a MacBook Air (running OSX as a footnote). I'm wondering who is having a hard time following the thread in this instance. At a minimum, you don't have to be so rude to shoot down an otherwise clearly formed observation.
Slashdot Mirror
I prefer British English "sacked".
What drives me crazy is the notion that a business is "failing" if they do anything but get bigger and bigger year after year. Is the goal of a business to take over the world, or to provide goods/services?
I can't speak for original, but "better" to me exists REGARDLESS of price. The price of something is totally irrelevant to how well something works. As stated, Intel just makes a better processor at the moment.
The article implies that the most layoffs will be in Germany, so I'm not sure what long term impact that would have on the "whole economy". I'm not one to poo poo job losses, but the sky definitely ISN'T falling (yet), especially if you check out the new AMD Campus here in Austin.
I used to think slashdot was a site about technology but now days it's just a bunch of paranoid conspiracy theorists worried about stuff that isn't happening, at the same time complaining about the Bush administration's culture of Fear.
Well now that he's still saying nice things about Microsoft but no longer works for them, I think he's definitely a shill. He definitely is demonstrating more restraint than I ever could.
I call BULL. A MacBook Pro has tons more graphic power than my MacBook, and my MacBook doesn't do it. My 8-year old G4 doesn't do it (even with only 768mb ram, stock ATI video card, while driving two 18" CRTs).
Don't forget, Apple has about a five year head-start on having windows that actually show the content when you move them around. It seems like Microsoft was in love with just showing the frame of the window until a just a couple of years ago.
Seriously, I hate this attitude, and it says more about your own insecurities than it does the reality of MOST Mac users. I'm almost starting to understand what it must be like to be the victim of racism, given the attitudes people hold about me, because I use a Mac, without even knowing me.
System 6 and my Mac Plus WERE the infancy state of the current paradigm of personal computing, not Commodore 64s, not Atari 800s, hell, not even those amber/green IBMs. If YOU are older than 12 (what the hell does a stupid personal attack like that have to do with anything?), you'd have to admit that computer technology changed by the week back then. One day my firm was using little black and white Mac Plusses, then the next day I was doing full color two page layout with a Mac IIfx. The day after that, I was on the Internets through some cool thing called Prodigy.
Now if you'd like to discuss how the System 6 to System 7 transition was so bad instead of making bad guesses at my age, I'm all ears.
The only thing making the switch to PPC chips painful was that the CPUs got so fast so quickly, they rendered any chip more than a year old obsolete, regardless of its underlying architecture. I don't recall any application actually not working after switching to a PPC.
I had ZERO broken apps in the 9-OSX transition. The only problem in the entire switch over came years later when they never made an OSX version of Myth and Myth II, and my current Macs can no longer run OS9. Since both those games were hybrid PCs, I can actually play them on my Intel Mac (in PC mode). So yeah, kudos to Microsoft for maintaining backwards compatibility for my desire to play an obsolete game.
Wow. If you re-read your entry (the sad commentary that it is), you'll probably notice that it says more about YOU than it does Apple, Inc. This is also an unfortunate all-too-frequent attitude that I just don't get. It's a computer, deal with it. If you don't like it, use a different one. I bet you hate people who drive BMWs too, or who live in nice big houses, eh?
Uh, your link separates MacIntel from Mac OS. What in the hell does that mean? Intel Macs running OSX vs. PPC Macs running OSX? If that's the case, then it should just be one combined number, since they are using the same OS and it is a chart about OS use, not hardware use. In any case, let's have this conversation again in about five years.
Well stated. Microsoft isn't evil because they are big. They are evil because their products suck. That probably has a lot to do with the fact they are big, though, so in a round-a-bout way, I guess they are evil because they are big.
If "everyone knows how to use" Microsoft operating systems, yet they STILL work as poorly as they do, I guess the "blame the user" excuse is out the window? What does this imply about the quality of Windows, if everyone knows how to use it, yet there are still so many problems?
Mac: plug in the drive, double-click to open it, and drag the files from it. Then unmount it from Finder and walk off.
What is the difference?
It's a shame this is an old thread and nobody will see my response.The difference(s) are: with Windows, you plug in the drive and "hope" that you see "new device recognized". In more times than I care to recall, the most recently being an embarrassing moment I tried to demonstrate my company's USB fingerprint reader, the device I plug into WinXP isn't recognized, or isn't working properly due to some driver issue. With a Mac, an icon of the actual device shows up on your desktop, with no need to "assure" the user that the "new device" is working properly via "a few dialogues", and definitely no annoying driver issues.
Then there's the whole issue of Windows starting to copy files across drives and not telling you there isn't enough space on the target drive until you've gotten 75% of the way done and have wasted several minutes. With OSX, it tells you right up front that there isn't enough space.
Finally, I know it always says not to, but with OSX I've never lost a single bit of data by unplugging a device without "unmounting" it first. I can't say the same for WinXP.
So to the casual observer, yeah, they do the same thing, but the refinement in the way OSX goes about it seems to be lost on most casual observers.
There are probably a million creative professionals right now that would like to line you up and smack you for your ignorance. Are you implying that firewire sucks and USB2 is the better alternative? Maybe I miss your point? Can you actually defend your statement with any sort of technical logic? For all I've read in the past 10 years, there's a technical reason firewire is THE standard used for digital video and another opposite reason why USB2 isn't.
As long as Apple keeps their corporate culture alive and doesn't succomb to the disease of the big-business, design-by-committee, process-driven business models of Microsoft and others, then Apple will always be a favorite (and yes, the underdog, and yes, the niche market). Huge corporate successes will imply that Apple has indeed sold out and, by definition, not be as good as they are now.
Oh, sorry. "Race" was my emphasis. I'm just too lazy to do the italics tags.
Off topic, but I'll chime in. I use Safari primarily, with Firefox and Camino (less-and-less these days). Safari is faster and more stable; as in rock-solid stable...as in never crashes. I keep going back to Firefox because Slashdot tells me I should, but after the third crash per day, I give up and go back to Safari. I find myself not worrying so much these days and just using Safari most of the time. I can't log into my work time-card with Safari though (stupid Microsoft) so I keep Firefox around. Camino is an interesting Mac-centric product, but come on, a browser is just a browser and I really don't see the need to hoard browsers.
I'm not him, but agree with him. I've noticed that the reaction of this entire thread has been on the fact they hacked a MacBook Air (running OSX as a footnote). I'm wondering who is having a hard time following the thread in this instance. At a minimum, you don't have to be so rude to shoot down an otherwise clearly formed observation.