Parents should take responsibility for their kids' viewing, and their own. Rather than dilute cable to the lowest common denominator, they should filter what they don't like. I agree wholeheartedly! However, we live in a (almost necessary) dual-income society where it's much easier for parents to pop in a dvd, feed them microwaveable food & allow kids to monitor themselves. Sad, but true, that television has become the new babysitter.
Like Dr. Oz said on an episode of Oprah (back in like Nov. '06) in reference to kids' eating habits:
Kids won't pay attention to what you tell them to eat but they WILL pay attention (& mimic) what you, as the parent, is eating.
The same applies to their viewing, exercise & socialization habits. I just wish more parents listened to & understood these concepts...our future is depending on it.
I agree that alpha/beta/release has nothing to do w/the SW's state of quality or maturity. Your resume, while quite impressive, still doesn't explain that alpha/beta/release has NO correlation whatsoever w/who's testing & their relationship to the SW. I'll take the gaming industry, for example, where you can have outside testers (fan web portals, friends & family, etc.) be involved in the process in alpha AND beta. My point is that your premise that "alpha testing is testing by people who participated in the design and/or implementation" is completely off-base- which it is as it's not completely confined to those individuals.
I also agree that SW QA has been going downhill for a long time. But since you've had such an illustrious career in the field, you of all people should know a few of the reasons for this. QA is an afterthought for many organizations trying to get away with the bare minimum that their bottom line will allow. QA, often times, is the redheaded stepchild of the SDLC. There's ALWAYS a slip in the schedule (for a myriad of reasons) & it's up to QA to make up the time & get the project back on track, time line-wise. Due to a lack of planning, this isn't always successful & QA has to fall on the sword. Everyone's to blame, honestly (since there's SO many SW titles that are "released" when they shouldn't be), but from my mere (in your eyes) experience, blame lies mostly on Project Managers & Producers who make the unrealistic schedules to begin with (many times, caving in to executives who "corner" them into SDLC dates just to appease them). But like I said, since you've got 20 yrs. more experience than I, you should know this as well. I know I wasn't around when you were programming in punch cards but a fellow dev like yourself should understand the bigger picture or is this bitterness something I have to look forward to when I'm an old fogey as well? Oh & the Microsoft reference was a joke, or were you too bitter at anyone opposing your omniscient viewpoint to notice?/smile
That's true & thank goodness noone's trying to "share" any of that cruddy music. As much as I'm anti-RIAA, it sure seems like they have a strong case here.
Like I've blogged & talked about countless times in the past, big-time record labels are pulling at straws. Lots of young, up & coming artists are bypassing them altogether in favor of digital distribution or indie labels (where they get a larger chunk of the pie AND get to maintain more creative control, to boot). I've been producing music for nearly 11 years, have tons of friends who are musicians, DJ's, radio disc jockeys & beat makers/producers. We talk about the imminent doom of big-time record labels as we know it ALL the time. It's really the recording industry's fault for pushing $15 albums that contained maybe 1-2 good songs for such a LONG time. Musicians are partially to blame as well as the recording industry's allowed them to get away with it- as an example, how many corny-ass rappers do we have making MAD duckets off of ZERO SKILLZ? Ying-Yan Twins, Chingy, 50Cent...I could go on for days (not picking on rap, as there are many talented artists in this genre, but it's by far the easiest to make an example out of).
The music industry is changing & they just don't know what to do about myspace, beatport, iTunes, snocap, cdbaby, etc. The jig is up & they're feeling the pressure & suing the pants off of everyone in a system that they created & coddled. I wish I could sue the recording industry for the 500+ albums I own where 1-2 songs out of the 20+ per album (5-10%) are barely worth a damn! Payback's a beyotch & Karma's yo' mama!
As long as there's a black market for goods- in this case, gold in video games- you'll have people using, profiting & exploiting from it. This is nothing new, has been around forever & will continue until the end of time. We have the right to not use said services or purchase ill-gotten goods. Regardless, there'll always be people willing to pay for a $10 hooker, pirated movie dvd's, illegal drugs, that knockoff Prada bag or "blood diamonds" just to show someone how much you love them (while someone might've died in a mine somewhere during it's discovery).
It's basic capitalism: as long as people see value in their purchase, they'll be a part of it &, in this case, people figure out how much their time is worth & if it's greater than what they're paying for their gold purchases, they're vindicated in their eyes (& who's to tell them they're wrong)!!!
Oh my, those are some hilarious ads! Of course, it's all in retrospect. We all remember internal DVD-rom drives costing $5,000 back in the day. It's always like that but it was nice to actually see & read some of the ole sk00l ads from ComputerWorld.
I couldn't have said it more eloquently, FP. Also, as someone else said, it all comes down to the fact that this administration (maybe more than any other in recent memory) is in the hip pocket of big business &, as evidenced by Pres. Bush's comments, couldn't care less about what the wishes of the people are.
Loving America as much as I do, & seeing so much potential to "be more than we can be" (sorry, had to steal that saying here), it just saddens me. What ever happened to "government BY the people, FOR the people?!!
Yup, props on the tea infuser...been meaning to get 1 of dem for the longest (so thx for that link as well). Giving back to the actual artisan groups is a good thang.
I wasn't favoring one side or the other, I was just opining for clarity's sake based on the spin & semantics being used by said gp.
Sorry if you took offense, that's your right but it wasn't intended as such. I'm quite learned in history & politics & all I was saying was "let's look at it from the other side" or as Trippeh put it "from the other side of the wall." Then again, how dare I do that?! I should just allow the blinders to stay on, eh? TGIF!!!
Must be nice cherry-picking what you want to hear. You totally missed the point: I'm not saying democracy vs communism. Your whole 20 page paper of a post talked about China doing all this shady intelligence stuff & all I'm saying is the U.S. does the exact same thing. Noone's arguing the merits of freedom here but people who live in glass houses shouldn't be hurling stones...
I swear, we as Americans are so freaking self-righteous! We're the ONLY ones that can protect "our" internet. We're the ONLY ones who can monetarily profit from the expansion of China. We're the ONLY ones who should own nuclear weapons & should dictate who else can & can't!
I'd give you a +1 just for the length if your long, drawn-out diatribe wasn't riddled with subtle rifts of "I'm American, Hear me Roar!" You speak of "the spread of propaganda" & the use of "deception, disinformation & influence" by the Chinese yet we, as Americans, have been doing it for MUCH longer! As Robert Burns said in a poem:
"Ah that there would be someone to give us
Eyes to see ourselves as others see us"
First it was their own users w/their increased pricing plan (the same folks who BUILT their vast empire). Now they're getting all huffy over Google Checkout? It was a "party" for pete's sake (which in their nerdy world means: bad chips & dip, kool-aid, guys wallflower'ing as they discuss Wizards of the Coast while they avoid the girls-/shudder dancing- & 80's pop star Tiffany as "entertainment")!
Goes to show how out-of-touch eBay is becoming w/the masses. They swear they've got the market cornered & anyone trying to infringe upon that will just get summarily blitzkrieg'ed. Sounds like eBay's been taking business classes over at Micro$oft & Tivo'ing all the X-Files reruns from the Sci-Fi channel. When Meg Whitman finally "gets" the fact that Google has WAY more street cred than eBay (& that adopting Google Checkout is a wise business decision), she'll finally do something positive for her shareholders.
"Alpha" testing is testing by people who participated in the design and/or implementation. Any testing by people not in those teams is, by definition, "Beta" testing.
Alpha/Beta/Release is not a measure of quality or maturity. It just tells who is testing, and their relationship to the software. You're COMPLETELY off-base on this. I've worked in software QA for ~10yrs & different companies/products have varying meanings (but some things are pretty standard). Early-alpha usually means it's being tested in-house. The Alpha stage is also, mostly, tested in-house but can be extended to vested/interested parties on a very select basis. Beta testing stages is when you see the most outside testing. Lastly, alpha/beta/release stages ARE a measure of quality/maturity as certain pre-determined, in-house milestones have to be reached before the software can be labeled as such, or progress in stage. The only exception, of course, is anything touched by Microsoft- in which case even 5 years after "release," users who paid for their "released" software are STILL beta-testing.
If you're going to come off as if you know something about a topic, you should at least do your homework before spewing nonsense. By your definition, it would seem that once something goes beta, the developers stop testing which even the noobiest of noobs knows isn't the case.
So here's the deal, sure it's a phone being produced by Apple- which has had a VERY good track record of innovation in terms of ease of use & fun/wow factors. But seriously, though, it's a f'ing phone. Like Bobby Brown said, if you wanna dish out $600 (i'm sure it'll be more due to limited supply) for something that you can pretty much already freaking do, "it's your perrogative." But when you're 60 years old & you realize Social Security is no longer there for you (even though you put into the system just as much as the next person), I bet you will regret the purchase & wish you'd dropped that kinda cash on the stock market, your 401k or, heck, even a CD or money market acct.
Seriously, all the fanbois need to get their hands out of their pockets!
Re:The GPL: Intellectual Theft...NOT!
on
GPLv2 Vs. GPLv3
·
· Score: 1
I don't see how you consider it "intellectual theft." You were perfectly willing to use a Free Open-Source Software solution & its kernel to you & your company's competitive advantage but not willing to post the source code of your "hard work?" This implies that the folks who built the kernel, or modified it before you, didn't put in any "hard work" into the project you were so willingly & ready to exploit for your own competitive advantage. It's like the old saying, "you can't have your cake & eat it too." You seem like a smart solution provider so I'm sure you've heard this before: RTFM!
As a hardcore proponent of FOSS, it sounds like GPLv3 is a step in the right direction (admittedly, though, I don't know all the hidden nuances) as it seems more conducive to creating a community of free software. To me, folks that keep cowering under their Windows-only "solutions" just don't see the larger picture. It's more than "look at me, I created this & I'm hoarding it all." It should be more about, "sure I created this, but who else will make it better (& maybe I can benefit from that down the road)." Once the masses start seeing that we ALL have more to gain through the GPL & FOSS, the world will be a better, more cohesive & more advanced place. Maybe it's just here in the States, but I see way too much of the "what can I take, exploit & hoard" mentality. I can only thank all the good folks who see beyond such a barbaric existence.
Or shall I say: have we forgotten WHERE he's from? Bush is from Texas, land of oil & refineries. Do you seriously think he's going to do anything to hurt profits of the people that BOUGHT his election (or have we also forgotten about the "coincidence" involving his brother being the Governor of Florida during the famous "hanging chad" debacle?). Gas prices are at an all-time high here in the States &, in my estimation, it has EVERYTHING to do with Bush- I've never seen it this high & i was born in '73 (ok, i don't remember the gas shortage of '76 but it happened). It's true what another commenter mentioned re: not believing what mass media is ramming down our throats, it's all a pack of lies aimed at keeping big business' fat pockets lined with greenbacks. All this while lots of major corporations are moving their entire headquarters, taking thousands of jobs with them overseas (ie. Halliburton moving to Saudi Arabia, which btw, Vice President Cheney is still a major stockholder in, all while receiving over $2 Billion in contracts during this fake "war" in Iraq).
Mass media is to blame for a few things, though. Look at rap videos, everyone's in love with them (even suburban, caucasian youths) & what do they push? They tell us that in order to be successful, we need to drive SUVs with 30" rims & wear ice/bling that's as heavy as we are (which is retarded if you ask me 'cuz how many Africans died to make 50 Cent's "rope chain w/diamonds" & last time i checked, he was black too...but I digress).
It's good to see that companies are at least providing the opportunity for their employees to telecommute. I mean, it's the least they could do, since some of these companies are the same ones that are offshoring tech jobs like tech support, etc. Which means that tech workers now have to DRIVE further for their jobs (since the ones closeby got offshored), if they can even find jobs at all. Regardless, I chastise the crap out of my friends/acquaintances who drive bigass SUV's when they have no business even owning one (are single, don't have kids & don't coach little league) & I suggest you all do the same. We all know at least 1 person like this & if we could just be the conduit of change, it would at least be a start. I, for one, will continue driving my p.o.s. 4-cylinder as my little way of leaving a smaller footprint on our environment but also in an effort to guzzle less gas.
I mean, really, it's not a huge download & what's so hard about trying it out yourself? Personally, I've had zero problems with it. The load times when opening an MS document are minimal to me compared to the alternative. It's free, it's open source, it's feature-rich & more are constantly getting added, there's a template repository freely available & (most importantly) it's not an MS solution which means your virus threat level isn't sky high!
I swear, the internet's a wonderful thing but questions like this just go to show how lazy people have become. It's YOUR business, try it yourself? Sure, lots of folks here can give you their points-of-views but how do you know how it will directly affect YOUR business unless you try it yourself? Give it a test run & kick the tires for pete's sake (wouldn't you do that if you were buying a new car or would you just go online & read the reviews & solely base your purchase on that?)!!!
Let's sit back & really think about the implications of this:
1) If you have to pay customers to use it, it's not a very good product
2) If you have to pay customers to use it, you're grasping at strings to hold on to the very little (I doubt msn has 10%) market share you do have
3) This is just another way that MS is trying to "bully" their way around (using cash, as always, instead of solid design fundamentals)
4) By offering "MS Training," MS is just trying to keep the corporate IT professionals who only know MS products in those organizations (if you're an IT professional & ALL YOU KNOW IS MS, don't you think when decision time comes on solutions, you'll suggest an MS product? it's called job security)
When you look at the sum of the whole, all it points to is Microsoft being increasingly desperate to maintain their well-bought foothold in the corporate environment. Everything they've been doing lately points to this- suing the pants off of anyone who gets in their way, offering free domain names for beta testers of Office Live, etc. This being March Madness & all, it reminds me of a team who has had a large lead get whittled away by the feisty upstart (OSX, Linux, OpenOffice.org, Google, the open document format, etc.)...they don't know how to handle it & panic, until finally the upstart catches 'em & eventually passes 'em & wins the game partly because of their increased momentum & partly because the team in the lead got caught like a deer in headlights.
I recently wrote an article on the beauty of giving my friend's kindgartener her very own copy of the Edubuntu 6.10 LiveCD. In a nutshell, she loved it & is getting lots of use out of it. Her parents love it since there's nothing to install. Then again, this isn't the normal type of gift you give 5-6 year old kids but I prefer to give kids books or learning materials instead of video games & dollies (mostly since the human brain is SO much of a sponge at that stage of development that, imho, if they're not learning, you're handcuffing them for the rest of their life). The (obvious) benefit of a Linux distro is cost but a side benefit is that you're also teaching them a completely different OS (which is like teaching your kids 2 speech languages at once)!
Having said that, though, you have to be careful how much you allow them to play on the computer. I'm a very BIG believer in that kids should be outside playing & interacting as this develops a healthy appreciation for nature as well social skills. You see, I have a BIG BEEF with how are children are being raised (here in the US), you never see kids playing out in the streets anymore (something I looked forward to daily when I was growing up). Instead, parents drop a dvd into the dvd player, buy their kids xbox'es and/or allow their kids too much time on the computer. Sure, it's borne out of the need for 2-income households these days (meaning no time to be w/the kids) but I'm very worried for our future leaders. This behavior might (but hopefully won't) lead to our nation's future leaders having ZERO SOCIAL SKILLS! I mean, kids don't even know how to share these days, how are they supposed to learn diplomacy & pass good laws when our lives are in their hands in the future?
In the end, a healthy mix of educational software (there's other Linux distros like eduMorphix, etc.), books & social interactivity with children their age are the best "tools" for your pre-school.
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Like Dr. Oz said on an episode of Oprah (back in like Nov. '06) in reference to kids' eating habits:
Kids won't pay attention to what you tell them to eat but they WILL pay attention (& mimic) what you, as the parent, is eating.
The same applies to their viewing, exercise & socialization habits. I just wish more parents listened to & understood these concepts...our future is depending on it.
I agree that alpha/beta/release has nothing to do w/the SW's state of quality or maturity. Your resume, while quite impressive, still doesn't explain that alpha/beta/release has NO correlation whatsoever w/who's testing & their relationship to the SW. I'll take the gaming industry, for example, where you can have outside testers (fan web portals, friends & family, etc.) be involved in the process in alpha AND beta. My point is that your premise that "alpha testing is testing by people who participated in the design and/or implementation" is completely off-base- which it is as it's not completely confined to those individuals.
/smile
I also agree that SW QA has been going downhill for a long time. But since you've had such an illustrious career in the field, you of all people should know a few of the reasons for this. QA is an afterthought for many organizations trying to get away with the bare minimum that their bottom line will allow. QA, often times, is the redheaded stepchild of the SDLC. There's ALWAYS a slip in the schedule (for a myriad of reasons) & it's up to QA to make up the time & get the project back on track, time line-wise. Due to a lack of planning, this isn't always successful & QA has to fall on the sword. Everyone's to blame, honestly (since there's SO many SW titles that are "released" when they shouldn't be), but from my mere (in your eyes) experience, blame lies mostly on Project Managers & Producers who make the unrealistic schedules to begin with (many times, caving in to executives who "corner" them into SDLC dates just to appease them). But like I said, since you've got 20 yrs. more experience than I, you should know this as well. I know I wasn't around when you were programming in punch cards but a fellow dev like yourself should understand the bigger picture or is this bitterness something I have to look forward to when I'm an old fogey as well? Oh & the Microsoft reference was a joke, or were you too bitter at anyone opposing your omniscient viewpoint to notice?
That's true & thank goodness noone's trying to "share" any of that cruddy music. As much as I'm anti-RIAA, it sure seems like they have a strong case here.
Like I've blogged & talked about countless times in the past, big-time record labels are pulling at straws. Lots of young, up & coming artists are bypassing them altogether in favor of digital distribution or indie labels (where they get a larger chunk of the pie AND get to maintain more creative control, to boot). I've been producing music for nearly 11 years, have tons of friends who are musicians, DJ's, radio disc jockeys & beat makers/producers. We talk about the imminent doom of big-time record labels as we know it ALL the time. It's really the recording industry's fault for pushing $15 albums that contained maybe 1-2 good songs for such a LONG time. Musicians are partially to blame as well as the recording industry's allowed them to get away with it- as an example, how many corny-ass rappers do we have making MAD duckets off of ZERO SKILLZ? Ying-Yan Twins, Chingy, 50Cent...I could go on for days (not picking on rap, as there are many talented artists in this genre, but it's by far the easiest to make an example out of).
The music industry is changing & they just don't know what to do about myspace, beatport, iTunes, snocap, cdbaby, etc. The jig is up & they're feeling the pressure & suing the pants off of everyone in a system that they created & coddled. I wish I could sue the recording industry for the 500+ albums I own where 1-2 songs out of the 20+ per album (5-10%) are barely worth a damn! Payback's a beyotch & Karma's yo' mama!
As long as there's a black market for goods- in this case, gold in video games- you'll have people using, profiting & exploiting from it. This is nothing new, has been around forever & will continue until the end of time. We have the right to not use said services or purchase ill-gotten goods. Regardless, there'll always be people willing to pay for a $10 hooker, pirated movie dvd's, illegal drugs, that knockoff Prada bag or "blood diamonds" just to show someone how much you love them (while someone might've died in a mine somewhere during it's discovery).
It's basic capitalism: as long as people see value in their purchase, they'll be a part of it &, in this case, people figure out how much their time is worth & if it's greater than what they're paying for their gold purchases, they're vindicated in their eyes (& who's to tell them they're wrong)!!!
Oh my, those are some hilarious ads! Of course, it's all in retrospect. We all remember internal DVD-rom drives costing $5,000 back in the day. It's always like that but it was nice to actually see & read some of the ole sk00l ads from ComputerWorld.
I couldn't have said it more eloquently, FP. Also, as someone else said, it all comes down to the fact that this administration (maybe more than any other in recent memory) is in the hip pocket of big business &, as evidenced by Pres. Bush's comments, couldn't care less about what the wishes of the people are.
Loving America as much as I do, & seeing so much potential to "be more than we can be" (sorry, had to steal that saying here), it just saddens me. What ever happened to "government BY the people, FOR the people?!!
Yup, props on the tea infuser...been meaning to get 1 of dem for the longest (so thx for that link as well). Giving back to the actual artisan groups is a good thang.
I wasn't favoring one side or the other, I was just opining for clarity's sake based on the spin & semantics being used by said gp.
Sorry if you took offense, that's your right but it wasn't intended as such. I'm quite learned in history & politics & all I was saying was "let's look at it from the other side" or as Trippeh put it "from the other side of the wall." Then again, how dare I do that?! I should just allow the blinders to stay on, eh? TGIF!!!
Must be nice cherry-picking what you want to hear. You totally missed the point: I'm not saying democracy vs communism. Your whole 20 page paper of a post talked about China doing all this shady intelligence stuff & all I'm saying is the U.S. does the exact same thing. Noone's arguing the merits of freedom here but people who live in glass houses shouldn't be hurling stones...
& the U.S. doesn't do any of this?
I swear, we as Americans are so freaking self-righteous! We're the ONLY ones that can protect "our" internet. We're the ONLY ones who can monetarily profit from the expansion of China. We're the ONLY ones who should own nuclear weapons & should dictate who else can & can't!
I'd give you a +1 just for the length if your long, drawn-out diatribe wasn't riddled with subtle rifts of "I'm American, Hear me Roar!" You speak of "the spread of propaganda" & the use of "deception, disinformation & influence" by the Chinese yet we, as Americans, have been doing it for MUCH longer! As Robert Burns said in a poem:
"Ah that there would be someone to give us Eyes to see ourselves as others see us"
First it was their own users w/their increased pricing plan (the same folks who BUILT their vast empire). Now they're getting all huffy over Google Checkout? It was a "party" for pete's sake (which in their nerdy world means: bad chips & dip, kool-aid, guys wallflower'ing as they discuss Wizards of the Coast while they avoid the girls- /shudder dancing- & 80's pop star Tiffany as "entertainment")!
Goes to show how out-of-touch eBay is becoming w/the masses. They swear they've got the market cornered & anyone trying to infringe upon that will just get summarily blitzkrieg'ed. Sounds like eBay's been taking business classes over at Micro$oft & Tivo'ing all the X-Files reruns from the Sci-Fi channel. When Meg Whitman finally "gets" the fact that Google has WAY more street cred than eBay (& that adopting Google Checkout is a wise business decision), she'll finally do something positive for her shareholders.
If you're going to come off as if you know something about a topic, you should at least do your homework before spewing nonsense. By your definition, it would seem that once something goes beta, the developers stop testing which even the noobiest of noobs knows isn't the case.
So here's the deal, sure it's a phone being produced by Apple- which has had a VERY good track record of innovation in terms of ease of use & fun/wow factors. But seriously, though, it's a f'ing phone. Like Bobby Brown said, if you wanna dish out $600 (i'm sure it'll be more due to limited supply) for something that you can pretty much already freaking do, "it's your perrogative." But when you're 60 years old & you realize Social Security is no longer there for you (even though you put into the system just as much as the next person), I bet you will regret the purchase & wish you'd dropped that kinda cash on the stock market, your 401k or, heck, even a CD or money market acct.
Seriously, all the fanbois need to get their hands out of their pockets!
I don't see how you consider it "intellectual theft." You were perfectly willing to use a Free Open-Source Software solution & its kernel to you & your company's competitive advantage but not willing to post the source code of your "hard work?" This implies that the folks who built the kernel, or modified it before you, didn't put in any "hard work" into the project you were so willingly & ready to exploit for your own competitive advantage. It's like the old saying, "you can't have your cake & eat it too." You seem like a smart solution provider so I'm sure you've heard this before: RTFM!
As a hardcore proponent of FOSS, it sounds like GPLv3 is a step in the right direction (admittedly, though, I don't know all the hidden nuances) as it seems more conducive to creating a community of free software. To me, folks that keep cowering under their Windows-only "solutions" just don't see the larger picture. It's more than "look at me, I created this & I'm hoarding it all." It should be more about, "sure I created this, but who else will make it better (& maybe I can benefit from that down the road)." Once the masses start seeing that we ALL have more to gain through the GPL & FOSS, the world will be a better, more cohesive & more advanced place. Maybe it's just here in the States, but I see way too much of the "what can I take, exploit & hoard" mentality. I can only thank all the good folks who see beyond such a barbaric existence.
Or shall I say: have we forgotten WHERE he's from? Bush is from Texas, land of oil & refineries. Do you seriously think he's going to do anything to hurt profits of the people that BOUGHT his election (or have we also forgotten about the "coincidence" involving his brother being the Governor of Florida during the famous "hanging chad" debacle?). Gas prices are at an all-time high here in the States &, in my estimation, it has EVERYTHING to do with Bush- I've never seen it this high & i was born in '73 (ok, i don't remember the gas shortage of '76 but it happened). It's true what another commenter mentioned re: not believing what mass media is ramming down our throats, it's all a pack of lies aimed at keeping big business' fat pockets lined with greenbacks. All this while lots of major corporations are moving their entire headquarters, taking thousands of jobs with them overseas (ie. Halliburton moving to Saudi Arabia, which btw, Vice President Cheney is still a major stockholder in, all while receiving over $2 Billion in contracts during this fake "war" in Iraq).
Mass media is to blame for a few things, though. Look at rap videos, everyone's in love with them (even suburban, caucasian youths) & what do they push? They tell us that in order to be successful, we need to drive SUVs with 30" rims & wear ice/bling that's as heavy as we are (which is retarded if you ask me 'cuz how many Africans died to make 50 Cent's "rope chain w/diamonds" & last time i checked, he was black too...but I digress).
It's good to see that companies are at least providing the opportunity for their employees to telecommute. I mean, it's the least they could do, since some of these companies are the same ones that are offshoring tech jobs like tech support, etc. Which means that tech workers now have to DRIVE further for their jobs (since the ones closeby got offshored), if they can even find jobs at all. Regardless, I chastise the crap out of my friends/acquaintances who drive bigass SUV's when they have no business even owning one (are single, don't have kids & don't coach little league) & I suggest you all do the same. We all know at least 1 person like this & if we could just be the conduit of change, it would at least be a start. I, for one, will continue driving my p.o.s. 4-cylinder as my little way of leaving a smaller footprint on our environment but also in an effort to guzzle less gas.
Everyone's already said what I felt but I LOL'ed.
I mean, really, it's not a huge download & what's so hard about trying it out yourself? Personally, I've had zero problems with it. The load times when opening an MS document are minimal to me compared to the alternative. It's free, it's open source, it's feature-rich & more are constantly getting added, there's a template repository freely available & (most importantly) it's not an MS solution which means your virus threat level isn't sky high!
I swear, the internet's a wonderful thing but questions like this just go to show how lazy people have become. It's YOUR business, try it yourself? Sure, lots of folks here can give you their points-of-views but how do you know how it will directly affect YOUR business unless you try it yourself? Give it a test run & kick the tires for pete's sake (wouldn't you do that if you were buying a new car or would you just go online & read the reviews & solely base your purchase on that?)!!!
Let's sit back & really think about the implications of this: 1) If you have to pay customers to use it, it's not a very good product 2) If you have to pay customers to use it, you're grasping at strings to hold on to the very little (I doubt msn has 10%) market share you do have 3) This is just another way that MS is trying to "bully" their way around (using cash, as always, instead of solid design fundamentals) 4) By offering "MS Training," MS is just trying to keep the corporate IT professionals who only know MS products in those organizations (if you're an IT professional & ALL YOU KNOW IS MS, don't you think when decision time comes on solutions, you'll suggest an MS product? it's called job security) When you look at the sum of the whole, all it points to is Microsoft being increasingly desperate to maintain their well-bought foothold in the corporate environment. Everything they've been doing lately points to this- suing the pants off of anyone who gets in their way, offering free domain names for beta testers of Office Live, etc. This being March Madness & all, it reminds me of a team who has had a large lead get whittled away by the feisty upstart (OSX, Linux, OpenOffice.org, Google, the open document format, etc.)...they don't know how to handle it & panic, until finally the upstart catches 'em & eventually passes 'em & wins the game partly because of their increased momentum & partly because the team in the lead got caught like a deer in headlights.
I recently wrote an article on the beauty of giving my friend's kindgartener her very own copy of the Edubuntu 6.10 LiveCD. In a nutshell, she loved it & is getting lots of use out of it. Her parents love it since there's nothing to install. Then again, this isn't the normal type of gift you give 5-6 year old kids but I prefer to give kids books or learning materials instead of video games & dollies (mostly since the human brain is SO much of a sponge at that stage of development that, imho, if they're not learning, you're handcuffing them for the rest of their life). The (obvious) benefit of a Linux distro is cost but a side benefit is that you're also teaching them a completely different OS (which is like teaching your kids 2 speech languages at once)!
Having said that, though, you have to be careful how much you allow them to play on the computer. I'm a very BIG believer in that kids should be outside playing & interacting as this develops a healthy appreciation for nature as well social skills. You see, I have a BIG BEEF with how are children are being raised (here in the US), you never see kids playing out in the streets anymore (something I looked forward to daily when I was growing up). Instead, parents drop a dvd into the dvd player, buy their kids xbox'es and/or allow their kids too much time on the computer. Sure, it's borne out of the need for 2-income households these days (meaning no time to be w/the kids) but I'm very worried for our future leaders. This behavior might (but hopefully won't) lead to our nation's future leaders having ZERO SOCIAL SKILLS! I mean, kids don't even know how to share these days, how are they supposed to learn diplomacy & pass good laws when our lives are in their hands in the future?
In the end, a healthy mix of educational software (there's other Linux distros like eduMorphix, etc.), books & social interactivity with children their age are the best "tools" for your pre-school.
Buena Suerte!