And that is largely because they don't know better.
For most people, word processing == MS Office. Just like PCs come with Windows (is there anything else then? Well you could go for an Apple of course).
Document exchange for editing is within the company. Settle on one product (LibreOffice, MS Office, Google Docs, whatever) and you're fine.
Document exchange to external customers is in pdf format. They don't need to edit my invoices. Everyone can read pdf just fine, and what I'm using to create these files is irrelevant to them
Another thing to make them cheaper, is to make them smaller. I don't need 500 GB in my laptop, I don't need that much in my desktop. I'm even still using my 4G EEEPC 701, and disk space is not a concern (other things are, like it almost falling apart and the small screen). 4GB is enough for the OS and applications and leave 1.5 GB free; everything else I pull down my server. I've also not really much interest to carry around a huge movie set or so.
So how about a 50-100 GB SSD? Now that would be interesting. Can take OS, all my documents, some movies or anime to boot, and I'm happy.
iPhone and iPad are not known as powerful devices; computing power lags far behind a typical desktop at double the price. Form factor (and the touch screens) add a lot of cost.
So far RISC is only found in low-power applications (when it comes to consumer devices at least).
Sure it has advantages, but obviously it's not all that great. After all Apple ditched the RISC-type PowerPC for CISC-type Intel chips a while back, and they don't seem to be in any hurry to move back. It seems no-one can beat the price/performance of the CISC-based x86 chips...
Apple's tease launches (and soon they will start for the iPhone 5S or 6 or whatever it's going to be) come in the form of "rumours". Rumours that are often proven to be remarkably accurate. They also come in the form of accidentally (or is it?) lost prototype devices. And then indeed they have the real launch with a lot of pomp and circumstance.
Windows Mobile bears absolutely no resemblence to Windows Phone, especially not to WP8, and that includes the design decisions.
When it comes to marketing, image and perception is way more important than reality.
Image and perception you need to make sales going. MS doesn't have either of them working for them, so no-one is buying. Even if reality is different.
For a successful product, you first have to make sure the image and perception are good. And secondly that they're backed up by reality. Apple gets this, and most Android phone vendors too. They create the hype, and when the product comes out it fulfills most if not all expectations.
Microsoft's track record is mostly the opposite - and that doesn't work well when there are real competitors.
Do be reminded that the rest of the world doesn't have those long contracts. Two years is four generations in the smart phone market. And yes plenty of people will buy a new one when the next generation is available. The market moves way faster than those two-year contracts make you believe.
And for most people, if they buy a phone they really don't like, they'll resell it in the second hand market and get another one. Sticking two years to a phone means you really like it.
From many years ago I recall an experiment where any surface could be turned into a keyboard: the projection would be through special glasses that overlay the keyboard image on the surface, and it used motion detection to see which keys were pressed.
Downside: it only worked for people that are really good at touch-typing, so good they don't even have a need for the touch anymore but where their fingers just know the position of the keys perfectly. Never came out of the prototype stage.
Like Win7 over Vista, they're pushing WP8 over WP7 to forget about the disaster that was the previous version. And maybe it's actually good. Having a third serious competitor can only be good for the overall market.
I'm currently using China Mobile HK on a $35 (USD 4.5) a monthly plan. Includes 700 minutes air time iirc... not sure... enough for me at least. Used to be on New World Telecom, they have even cheaper plans available, as low as USD 2.5/month (but only 300 minutes air time a month). Great for second numbers that are permanently diverted to your main number.
And by the way, what does your carrier have to do with what phone you use? You buy them via your carrier or so? I never do that, they're always more expensive than the independent handset shop next door. If I were to buy one with plan (which is basically on instalment basis) they usually add data plans in the mix indeed. But of course that's not necessary.
This story comes hot on the heels of Facebook complaining html5 was a bad choice for their app as it was too slow compared to native.
And now they want to run this already-slow (compared to native at least - and it will always be slower than native code) and put it on low-end hardware. Slow+slow. Great plan.
Newsflash: you don't need a mobile data plan to enjoy a smart phone.
Most of them do WiFi too, if you really need data, and a large number of apps don't need data other than for downloading ads. I'm very happy with my smartphone and 2G-only voice plan.
This is something the ISPs, the upstreams, well the big guys in general have to do. As an end user I couldn't care less. I don't know my IP address (yes I can look it up if really needed). I don't care what it is. I don't care if I'm on v4 or v5 or v6 or whatever. I just want an Internet connection. That's all. Just make sure my web sites resolve - that shouldn't be too hard either, I know there are v4-to-v6 and v.v. tricks.
As a savvy end user, for my home network, I will want to continue to use NAT or something equivalent. I don't want my printer, my desktop, my laptop and my phone that connect to the WiFi to have an externally approachable address. My router is what takes all the incoming connections and then passes on the few that are allowed. Just get me that Internet connection. Preferably in the form of a simple network cable that I can plug into my router, I'll build the network from there.
I don't care much if that incoming cable is using IPv4 or v6. The router takes care of that. OK mine is old, and will need replacement, that's a one time investment and I'm good for the next decade or so.
It's in the same light of my brand new TV (this week finally switched from an old CRT to a spanking new LED) that can receive digital signals. I basically don't care much whether I get an analog or digital signal, I just want to watch TV. Digital image is better, nice. Pretty newsreader is still pretty but now I see all the imperfections on her face. Bummer. Not exactly an improvement there.
Anyway back to IPv6. Why don't ISPs just switch over? Offer the option? Give new subscribers an IPv6 modem/router instead of an IPv4 modem/router, and so slowly move the subscriber base over? They tend to replace those devices every now and then anyway, so why aren't they replacing them with the new IP? It's using the same type of copper wire, doesn't it?
Most software patents today are written in functional terms. If courts would faithfully apply the 1952 Act, limiting those claims to the actual algorithms the patentees disclosed and their equivalents, they could prevent overclaiming by software patentees and solve much of the patent thicket problem that besets software innovation.
I'm not sure this would fix the problem. Sometimes, the fact that the algorithm is patented is the problem.
The MP3 patents come to mind there. And, related, video compression patents.
And, in a way, this is exactly where I think a software patent is defendable. They did not just patent the idea of "compressing digital sound" but a very specific way of doing this. This company spent a lot of effort in developing this method of compression, and then patented it. Sounds pretty much like a "machine" to me.
Those patents are also not exactly a problem. As in: everyone can do mp3 decompression, you just may have to pay for a patent license. Also everyone can develop a new method of sound compression (e.g. ogg) and they're not running foul of the MP3 patent.
This is what patents were designed to do: encourage people to build new technologies, that they subsequently get a temporary monopoly on. Someone had a great idea on how to compress sound, they worked it out, and got their patent. In time it'll come into the public domain, and everyone can use it without restrictions.
Yes I hear you all, "20 years is too long because computing moves so fast". Then please go ahead and build a better technology and make the still patented one obsolete, get yourself a patent on it, and start making money. That's exactly how it's supposed to work. Or if this mp3 tech is really so good that you can't come up with something better, suck it up and pay your license fees. Intel definitely has many patents on their chip manufacturing tech, which is also moving fast, so very likely they have still valid patents on several generations of already obsolete tech.
Troublesome are the patents that cover an idea rather than an implementation, such as the infamous one-click patent. That's about the function of the button, not the implementation of the button. So everyone who wants to implement such a one-click purchase system, runs foul of the patent, even if they develop their own algorithms to do this.
I've never seen a chess player, also not a top grade one, sweat as much as say a cyclist. Or a marathon runner. If your brain starts using 180W, that's a lot of heat being produced (all energy used will end up as heat). Plus the normal 50-100W to keep your body working, and you'll get really hot really fast.
A backlit screen will use at the very least the power it emits in light, etc..
The problem is that we're still stuck with backlit screens.
The next logical step is that the back light can go, like in current e-ink. Sure there's quite a way to go, but I'm positive we'll eventually get there. A display that has vivid colours, fast refresh rates, no afterglow, and uses ambient light (reflective) to be readable. Power consumption: almost zero.
It is even more sane than that. And maybe a bit insane.
First of all he's not fined for the copyright violation (his wife admitted to this, through a written and signed statement), but for not policing his Internet connection well enough, so someone could use it for unlawful purposes such as illegally downloading these songs. That may be a bit insane, but it's not that crazy - under French law the "it's an open access point, it's not my responsibility what happens on it" argument is simply not a valid defence. Whether you agree with it or not, it's from a law enforcement pov a very sane rule.
Secondly the fine I think is reasonable for the offence. Far more reasonable than the claims in the Jammie Thomas case.
Thirdly, it's a police tribunal, not a full-fledged court. From the wikipedia page, this I think is the court mentioned in the article, it appears to be a very simple and fast form of jurisdiction so costs will be low. And, assuming defendant accepts the judgement, it's not going to drag on for years and years. Probably no lawyers involved even, there is at least no mention of lawyers.
It is not clear to me who is initiating this suit, but from the article I get the feeling Hadopi falls under criminal law, so that would be the state prosecutor. Also under criminal law, the defendant normally doesn't have to pay court costs other than the fine.
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It not being able to run on Win7 or whatever future version of Windows will surely take care of that.
And that is largely because they don't know better.
For most people, word processing == MS Office. Just like PCs come with Windows (is there anything else then? Well you could go for an Apple of course).
Document exchange for editing is within the company. Settle on one product (LibreOffice, MS Office, Google Docs, whatever) and you're fine.
Document exchange to external customers is in pdf format. They don't need to edit my invoices. Everyone can read pdf just fine, and what I'm using to create these files is irrelevant to them
Another thing to make them cheaper, is to make them smaller. I don't need 500 GB in my laptop, I don't need that much in my desktop. I'm even still using my 4G EEEPC 701, and disk space is not a concern (other things are, like it almost falling apart and the small screen). 4GB is enough for the OS and applications and leave 1.5 GB free; everything else I pull down my server. I've also not really much interest to carry around a huge movie set or so.
So how about a 50-100 GB SSD? Now that would be interesting. Can take OS, all my documents, some movies or anime to boot, and I'm happy.
IPv4 is 32 bit; v6 is 128 bit, so should be 16 octets in that case. Getting really long.
that's the price of progress
iPhone and iPad are not known as powerful devices; computing power lags far behind a typical desktop at double the price. Form factor (and the touch screens) add a lot of cost.
So far RISC is only found in low-power applications (when it comes to consumer devices at least).
Nice advertisement for RISC architecture.
Sure it has advantages, but obviously it's not all that great. After all Apple ditched the RISC-type PowerPC for CISC-type Intel chips a while back, and they don't seem to be in any hurry to move back. It seems no-one can beat the price/performance of the CISC-based x86 chips...
Android based devices in general do not suck, and are mostly cheaper than iPhones.
Yet it's Apple that still dominates the market.
Apple's tease launches (and soon they will start for the iPhone 5S or 6 or whatever it's going to be) come in the form of "rumours". Rumours that are often proven to be remarkably accurate. They also come in the form of accidentally (or is it?) lost prototype devices. And then indeed they have the real launch with a lot of pomp and circumstance.
Windows Mobile bears absolutely no resemblence to Windows Phone, especially not to WP8, and that includes the design decisions.
When it comes to marketing, image and perception is way more important than reality.
Image and perception you need to make sales going. MS doesn't have either of them working for them, so no-one is buying. Even if reality is different.
For a successful product, you first have to make sure the image and perception are good. And secondly that they're backed up by reality. Apple gets this, and most Android phone vendors too. They create the hype, and when the product comes out it fulfills most if not all expectations.
Microsoft's track record is mostly the opposite - and that doesn't work well when there are real competitors.
I take it you're in the US.
Do be reminded that the rest of the world doesn't have those long contracts. Two years is four generations in the smart phone market. And yes plenty of people will buy a new one when the next generation is available. The market moves way faster than those two-year contracts make you believe.
And for most people, if they buy a phone they really don't like, they'll resell it in the second hand market and get another one. Sticking two years to a phone means you really like it.
From many years ago I recall an experiment where any surface could be turned into a keyboard: the projection would be through special glasses that overlay the keyboard image on the surface, and it used motion detection to see which keys were pressed.
Downside: it only worked for people that are really good at touch-typing, so good they don't even have a need for the touch anymore but where their fingers just know the position of the keys perfectly. Never came out of the prototype stage.
Like Win7 over Vista, they're pushing WP8 over WP7 to forget about the disaster that was the previous version. And maybe it's actually good. Having a third serious competitor can only be good for the overall market.
Just like how Apple demo'ed web surfing on their first iPhone? Not sluggish when you have it all cached.
I'm currently using China Mobile HK on a $35 (USD 4.5) a monthly plan. Includes 700 minutes air time iirc... not sure... enough for me at least. Used to be on New World Telecom, they have even cheaper plans available, as low as USD 2.5/month (but only 300 minutes air time a month). Great for second numbers that are permanently diverted to your main number.
And by the way, what does your carrier have to do with what phone you use? You buy them via your carrier or so? I never do that, they're always more expensive than the independent handset shop next door. If I were to buy one with plan (which is basically on instalment basis) they usually add data plans in the mix indeed. But of course that's not necessary.
Agreed.
This story comes hot on the heels of Facebook complaining html5 was a bad choice for their app as it was too slow compared to native.
And now they want to run this already-slow (compared to native at least - and it will always be slower than native code) and put it on low-end hardware. Slow+slow. Great plan.
Newsflash: you don't need a mobile data plan to enjoy a smart phone.
Most of them do WiFi too, if you really need data, and a large number of apps don't need data other than for downloading ads. I'm very happy with my smartphone and 2G-only voice plan.
Serious question. Why aren't we all on v6?
This is something the ISPs, the upstreams, well the big guys in general have to do. As an end user I couldn't care less. I don't know my IP address (yes I can look it up if really needed). I don't care what it is. I don't care if I'm on v4 or v5 or v6 or whatever. I just want an Internet connection. That's all. Just make sure my web sites resolve - that shouldn't be too hard either, I know there are v4-to-v6 and v.v. tricks.
As a savvy end user, for my home network, I will want to continue to use NAT or something equivalent. I don't want my printer, my desktop, my laptop and my phone that connect to the WiFi to have an externally approachable address. My router is what takes all the incoming connections and then passes on the few that are allowed. Just get me that Internet connection. Preferably in the form of a simple network cable that I can plug into my router, I'll build the network from there.
I don't care much if that incoming cable is using IPv4 or v6. The router takes care of that. OK mine is old, and will need replacement, that's a one time investment and I'm good for the next decade or so.
It's in the same light of my brand new TV (this week finally switched from an old CRT to a spanking new LED) that can receive digital signals. I basically don't care much whether I get an analog or digital signal, I just want to watch TV. Digital image is better, nice. Pretty newsreader is still pretty but now I see all the imperfections on her face. Bummer. Not exactly an improvement there.
Anyway back to IPv6. Why don't ISPs just switch over? Offer the option? Give new subscribers an IPv6 modem/router instead of an IPv4 modem/router, and so slowly move the subscriber base over? They tend to replace those devices every now and then anyway, so why aren't they replacing them with the new IP? It's using the same type of copper wire, doesn't it?
Here is the crucial quote from the abstract:
I'm not sure this would fix the problem. Sometimes, the fact that the algorithm is patented is the problem.
The MP3 patents come to mind there. And, related, video compression patents.
And, in a way, this is exactly where I think a software patent is defendable. They did not just patent the idea of "compressing digital sound" but a very specific way of doing this. This company spent a lot of effort in developing this method of compression, and then patented it. Sounds pretty much like a "machine" to me.
Those patents are also not exactly a problem. As in: everyone can do mp3 decompression, you just may have to pay for a patent license. Also everyone can develop a new method of sound compression (e.g. ogg) and they're not running foul of the MP3 patent.
This is what patents were designed to do: encourage people to build new technologies, that they subsequently get a temporary monopoly on. Someone had a great idea on how to compress sound, they worked it out, and got their patent. In time it'll come into the public domain, and everyone can use it without restrictions.
Yes I hear you all, "20 years is too long because computing moves so fast". Then please go ahead and build a better technology and make the still patented one obsolete, get yourself a patent on it, and start making money. That's exactly how it's supposed to work. Or if this mp3 tech is really so good that you can't come up with something better, suck it up and pay your license fees. Intel definitely has many patents on their chip manufacturing tech, which is also moving fast, so very likely they have still valid patents on several generations of already obsolete tech.
Troublesome are the patents that cover an idea rather than an implementation, such as the infamous one-click patent. That's about the function of the button, not the implementation of the button. So everyone who wants to implement such a one-click purchase system, runs foul of the patent, even if they develop their own algorithms to do this.
I've never seen a chess player, also not a top grade one, sweat as much as say a cyclist. Or a marathon runner. If your brain starts using 180W, that's a lot of heat being produced (all energy used will end up as heat). Plus the normal 50-100W to keep your body working, and you'll get really hot really fast.
Not sure how much the brain uses but it's probably an order of magnitude more.
And when it comes to computing, computers win. When it comes to pattern recognition, brains win. Just have to use the best tool for the job.
Why not just use a crystal receiver? No batteries needed, no charging, gets all the power from the radio mast.
May not work so well on mobile phone frequencies and so, but then the never-recharge feature should trump that minor inconvenience! AM radio ftw :-)
A backlit screen will use at the very least the power it emits in light, etc..
The problem is that we're still stuck with backlit screens.
The next logical step is that the back light can go, like in current e-ink. Sure there's quite a way to go, but I'm positive we'll eventually get there. A display that has vivid colours, fast refresh rates, no afterglow, and uses ambient light (reflective) to be readable. Power consumption: almost zero.
It is even more sane than that. And maybe a bit insane.
First of all he's not fined for the copyright violation (his wife admitted to this, through a written and signed statement), but for not policing his Internet connection well enough, so someone could use it for unlawful purposes such as illegally downloading these songs. That may be a bit insane, but it's not that crazy - under French law the "it's an open access point, it's not my responsibility what happens on it" argument is simply not a valid defence. Whether you agree with it or not, it's from a law enforcement pov a very sane rule.
Secondly the fine I think is reasonable for the offence. Far more reasonable than the claims in the Jammie Thomas case.
Thirdly, it's a police tribunal, not a full-fledged court. From the wikipedia page, this I think is the court mentioned in the article, it appears to be a very simple and fast form of jurisdiction so costs will be low. And, assuming defendant accepts the judgement, it's not going to drag on for years and years. Probably no lawyers involved even, there is at least no mention of lawyers.
It is not clear to me who is initiating this suit, but from the article I get the feeling Hadopi falls under criminal law, so that would be the state prosecutor. Also under criminal law, the defendant normally doesn't have to pay court costs other than the fine.