Okay, I assumed people would RTFA I linked to, but that was assuming too much. So, here is the interview with the relevant information:
As extensive as it is, the Apple site skips over several important points about the application and the market. For the real dirt, I interviewed the product manager, Joe Schorr. Keep on reading to find out how Aperture compares to Photoshop, whether you can really run the app on a PowerBook, why it costs almost $500, and more.
Terri Stone: Will Aperture replace Photoshop?
Joe Schorr: Depending on your workflow, there may be a need to use tools that go beyond Aperture. One of the things pros do is launch Photoshop, so we integrate with Photoshop.
Aperture was developed with photographers looking over our shoulders, literally. They picked apart our workflow, and we analyzed what they really do and touch.
We found out overwhelmingly that they all use Photoshop, but only a fraction of it. It became easy for us to develop our list of adjustments. We focused on an essential set. With that essential list, we covered well over 90 percent of what photographers do in Photoshop.
We think Photoshop is an incomparable tool for other things, such as compositing or making someone's nose thinner. Once you use Aperture to open an image in Photoshop and change it, the Photoshop version of the image lives in the stack. We manage all the versions you create with Photoshop.
Our job is getting you from 1,200 pictures to 60. Take wedding photographers. That whittling-down process is where they spend a lot of time. They told us that the single biggest bottleneck is photo editing. Not image editing, but selecting which images to focus on. So that's where we put the horsepower in Aperture -- in photo editing.
TS: Did Canon and Nikon help Apple develop your Raw parsers? Or did Apple have to figure out how to parse Canon and Nikon Raw images on its own?
JS: The Raw conversion code is OS-based. Of course, we talk to different camera vendors, but this is all code that we've written. The OS resources going into making Raw a first-class citizen are enormous. As the OS evolves, our Raw support automatically evolves, too. When you get software updates, any given update can contain aw updates. So one morning Aperture suddenly supports new formats.
People should understand that Raw is not a universal format. It varies from camera to camera. Our Web site has an up-to-date list of which Raw formats we support. We've specially optimized and fine-tuned the Raw decoder for the cameras used most by pros: the top Nikons and the Canons, for instance.
Now that we've announced Aperture, it's opened the way for us to have discussions with camera vendors and ask to be told of future development. There's intellectual property associated with way they do things. It's difficult to make it a lot of easier for the user.
TS: So Apple's Raw parsers are built into the OS, and that's where Aperture gets the information to generate previews for Raw images?
JS: Let's say you have a Canon 20D. If you took a Raw file from it today and double-clicked, the Mac opens the file in Preview. You can see the Raw file, but you can't do anything to it. There are no tools in Preview to take advantage of what you can do with that Raw file.
The benefit of Raw is that you can reprocess. In Aperture, we've given you the decoder to open the file and the tools to take advantage of it.
Let me also draw the distinction between Aperture and iPhoto. You can see a Raw image in iPhoto, but let's say you make an adjustment to the file, like changing contrast. In iPhoto, you now have an 8-bit JPEG. You've said goodbye to Raw.
So the iPhoto choices are that you work in the world of JPEG, or you go back to Raw and lose all the adjustments you've done in iPhoto. It's a binary decision.
Aperture never makes that conversion from Raw to JPEG. You crop it, you throw away pixels, and the original Raw image is
Below is a link to an interview with Apple Aperture Product Manager Joe Schorr, which I read over a month ago, and it answers most of your questions (and most of the other Slashdot readers questions):
Oh, give it a rest. Are you sure it isn't they are simply acting far more intelligent than you think you are? Everything tries to make everyone else out to be equal when that is absolutely not the case. Not everyone is brilliant, sorry to break it to you. If these people are smarter than %99.999 of the Earth's population, then they have every right in the world to act as arrogant as they wish. Well adjusted is a joke, it is simply a pigeonhole term used to try and make everyone who does not act like everyone else out to have some kind of problem.
Oh, give it a rest. Are you sure it isn't they are simply acting far more intelligent than you think you are? Everything tries to make everyone else out to be equal when that is absolutely not the case. Not everyone is brilliant, sorry to break it to you. If these people are smarter than %99.999 of the Earth's population, then they have every right in the world to act as arrogant as they wish. Well adjusted is a joke, it is simply a pigeonhole term used to try and make everyone who does not act like everyone else out to have some kind of problem.
PS - And if it turns out that if aliens are eventually found and they admit to having created life on our planet, that will be perfectly fine. And if, after rigorous scientific analysis, that conclusion is found to be true then it would answer some of the greatest mysteries of mankind. But, to hide behind the term Intelligent Design as if it is not defined in context in society as being strictly is use by the religious, is nothing but a facade. Until the day that the aliens land and tell us that they created life on our planet, or we discover any other scientfic reason, Intelligent Design is no more scientifically disprovable, repeatable, or predictable than any other no basis fantasy you want to come up with.
The fact is that Intelligent Design is religious in origin and illogical in its entirety. You do not explore Intelligent Design, because Intelligent Design = Religion = Fantasy. You explore reality and the tool for that is Science.
Windows and OS X don't even compete with the features I use a lot, such as working with remote servers
Like what exactly? Everything I have used and needed with OS X 10.3 and now 10.4 has worked absolutely flawlessly. I'll repeat, flawlessly. That has included SSH/Telnet/FTP, Cisco VPN, Remote Desktop, Windows Virtual/Web Drives (shared over the internet/WAN), File/Printer Sharing in a Windows Domain, and much more. Everything I have setup in Linux to match the ease of use of an Apple OS X machine in a networked environment has proven to be a huge pain in the ass.
What exactly on Linux makes its networking ease and power so much better than Apple OS X? If you say kioslaves/gfvs you've got to be kidding.
Exactly. I call this entire article and study complete bullshit. Another bad example of a bad study correlating unrelated or vaguely related data to draw a completely meaningless conclusion. Sure, buddy, all 5+ billion people in the world fall into two categories and only the introverts are the mentally superior ones. Give me a break.
There are hundreds, if not more, factors involved in someone's intellectual being. What about the brilliant mind who is an introvert when alone but loves to share and teach and enjoys interacting socially with people who share their common interests? Is this person worse off intellectually than someone who sits by themselves and shares with no one or has trouble sharing at all? What about people who are naturally born speakers or great with dealing with people in general but are also exceptional thinkers? What does the study have to say about those people? What about people who are brilliant but simply enjoy the company of others and feel good after physical activity?
I could go on, but the study is terminally flawed and once again draws false conclusions from bad data. It would be nice to have the link to send the authors of the study a note about their research, because all TOO often research is published and there is no way to say "Hey, that is a complete bunch of bullshit. Who peer reviewed this information?" Too often people take these kinds of studies as the truth without even thinking critically and analytically about the data and the conclusions. Which really makes you wonder about the introverts on Slashdot, since I have only seen a handful of people even question this data. Everyone else just seems to like it because it strokes their ego somehow.
Startup time should not be an issue any more with properly written programs using JDK 1.5 and up thanks to technologies such as Class Data Sharing. Thanks to Apple for pioneering this technology. There are many, many other examples and documentation on Sun's website explaining how to properly code Java programs to optimize their startup execution, but CDS is a technology aimed directly at assisting startup times of Java programs.
Java is exactly as other people say it is, fast and scalable, when written by professional Java programmers in a professional development environment. Judging Java by some no name piece of code is not exactly an intelligent judgement call.
Java does not earn its reputation, bad programming and bad programming practices give it a bad reputation, with those outside of the professional programming world.
As a Senior Software Engineer with over 8 years of Java programming experience, I can tell you that the real problem is that %99 of programmers do not know how to properly program Java or OOPL's in general. The other %1 do not put the time into making their Java programs professional grade. You can read Sun's JDK documentation and examples showing how Java -should- be programmed from an OOP perspective and how Java is very strict in its interpretation and usage. You can read Sun's documentation and example code showing how to optimize every aspect of a Java program, especially very large highly scaled applications. But, what is happening is that without even reading the Java documentation, bad C/C++ programmers are trying out Java, using bad C/C++ code practices and understanding, and applying them directly to Java. Sure, the bad Java code will compile and run, but will run very poorly. Then Java is blamed and the programmers go back to programming bad C/C++ code without even looking into what the problem may have been to begin with. And this does not even begin to cover people who are trying to transfer over from programming VB.
Now that C# is becoming more popular, which is very close in syntax and concept as Java, along with better Java IDE's, optimizers, programming and testing tools, excellent new JDK features and additions (1.5 is excellent and 1.6 looks to be even more exciting), and excellent JVM's for all supported platforms hopefully programmers will become more educated in programming Java and OOPL's in general.
I have personally, along with my programming team, written many J2SE and J2EE applications which are extremely fast, extremely stable, and extremely scalable. I can only think of a handful of applications which might be better written in any language -except- Java.
To add to what one of the parent posters said, Java bashers/haters are those who have no real experience with the language in a corporate or production environment, especially an environment run by a group of professional and experienced Java programmers. Most people's experiences with Java was back in the 1.0 days and have no idea how far Java has come to reach 1.5 and how many more exciting features are coming in 1.6. On the home computer side of things, Azuerus is nice, I use it myself but it is not the best Java code ever written. Nor has most of the Java code I have seen in the open source programs I have checked out in recent years.
Wow, talk about Intro to Philosophy 101. Not the brightest bulb in the box, are you?
Arguing words and meanings instead of the reality which they represent is pointless. Possession and ownership of something, whether it is just a mental construct of our existence, is a basic part of life for all higher level organisms. For all purposes it is just as real as living and breathing. Ever seen a beer scratching a tree or a dog peeing on a fire hydrant? Ever observe that socialism fails?
All parts of higher level existence such as competition, possession, ownership, value, etc. are as real as the terms used to represent them. It is all part of existence which is part of what makes our universe such an interesting place.
"Anyone with half a brain would invest in a desktop where replacing components is cheaper. Why pay a premium for a cpu that only works in a laptop where something as simple as swapping an HD can take a few days if not weeks and possibly more money than just buying the drive..."
Bull shit. I sold my desktop computer and bought a laptop for everything. I saved a ton of office space and I did not have to double my computing investment to get both worlds of processing power and portability. Since I do not play computer games on my computer, there was no reason in the world for me to not just buy an AMD64 laptop. Now, my development environment is both powerful and portable without taking up unneccesary space. Plus, with wireless networking, I can work anywhere in the house at any time or anywhere with wireless. And whenever I need to bring my development environment with me, I just pack up my laptop and I can go. Two things I could never do with the desktop computer. And what components are you talking about? The 4Ghz AMD64? The 100GB HDD? The 2GB of RAM? The 12 cell Lithium battery? Built-in 6-in-1 media card reader? What exactly am I so desperately missing out on that I will need to upgrade in the future at such a huge cost? I do not play games on my computer, so the video card is going to be good for many years to come. And the HDD size is perfectly fine since all of my big files are on external Firewire 800 HDD's anyways.
Your post is more bullshit from another Slashdot user who has never used his computer for anything except playing video games and surfing the internet.
Uh huh, sure buddy. Let's take a look at what you said again... " Its cool and all, and it seems to be fast enough to run quark, photoshop, illustrator, flash, and dreamweaver on my machine." And what kind of work do you do that requires more processing power than that? If you are doing huge photograph rendering and editing, I could see wanting a more powerful PowerPC machine, such as a G5. Heavy graphical or video work would require a much more powerful video card. But, by the sounds of your post, I think you either do not own an Apple laptop or do nothing more than surf the internet with it, click on a few items, count the time it takes for a few various programs to startup and try to make a statement about the performance of your Powerbook. Typical Slashdot garbage.
Nice post, but like most posts the poster has no real clue what he is posting about.
Fact: My wife and I own a Honda Insight
Fact: NiMH is recylcable and the metals are highly valuable
Fact: We have ~127,000 miles and a %100 perfect battery. Nationwide, the Honda Insight owners registry has most batteries being worked on after 200,000 miles. With zero non-maintenance repairs in the past ~127,000 miles, battery replacement is not a major financial consideration.
Too bad you got rated so high for such a clearly unintelligent post. My wife and I own a Honda Insight. We love driving it and love the fuel savings we achieve (64mpg lifetime average over ~127,000 miles). We even bought it used and now save enough in gas over our old car that we use the gas savings to pay for our Honda Insight loan and use our now none existant loan payment for fun money. Another HUGE point the linked article missed.
BUT, to get to your point, a couple of weeks ago my wife and I found this beautiful sleigh bed made by the Amish Store. Our current bed is in serious need to be replaced. Now, with no delivery available from the store, how in the hell were we going to get the bed home? It sure as hell wasn't going to be in the Honda Insight. So, I had to call my brother who has a large Chevy pickup truck to come to the store, pick up the bed and matresses, and help me move them to my place. On a weekend.
If there were no more cars, how would that be accomplished? Diesel delivery service? You seriously need to think about what the impacts of a vehicleless society would be before you post.
Slashdot Mirror
Okay, I assumed people would RTFA I linked to, but that was assuming too much. So, here is the interview with the relevant information:
As extensive as it is, the Apple site skips over several important points about the application and the market. For the real dirt, I interviewed the product manager, Joe Schorr. Keep on reading to find out how Aperture compares to Photoshop, whether you can really run the app on a PowerBook, why it costs almost $500, and more.
Terri Stone: Will Aperture replace Photoshop?
Joe Schorr: Depending on your workflow, there may be a need to use tools that go beyond Aperture. One of the things pros do is launch Photoshop, so we integrate with Photoshop.
Aperture was developed with photographers looking over our shoulders, literally. They picked apart our workflow, and we analyzed what they really do and touch.
We found out overwhelmingly that they all use Photoshop, but only a fraction of it. It became easy for us to develop our list of adjustments. We focused on an essential set. With that essential list, we covered well over 90 percent of what photographers do in Photoshop.
We think Photoshop is an incomparable tool for other things, such as compositing or making someone's nose thinner. Once you use Aperture to open an image in Photoshop and change it, the Photoshop version of the image lives in the stack. We manage all the versions you create with Photoshop.
Our job is getting you from 1,200 pictures to 60. Take wedding photographers. That whittling-down process is where they spend a lot of time. They told us that the single biggest bottleneck is photo editing. Not image editing, but selecting which images to focus on. So that's where we put the horsepower in Aperture -- in photo editing.
TS: Did Canon and Nikon help Apple develop your Raw parsers? Or did Apple have to figure out how to parse Canon and Nikon Raw images on its own?
JS: The Raw conversion code is OS-based. Of course, we talk to different camera vendors, but this is all code that we've written. The OS resources going into making Raw a first-class citizen are enormous. As the OS evolves, our Raw support automatically evolves, too. When you get software updates, any given update can contain aw updates. So one morning Aperture suddenly supports new formats.
People should understand that Raw is not a universal format. It varies from camera to camera. Our Web site has an up-to-date list of which Raw formats we support. We've specially optimized and fine-tuned the Raw decoder for the cameras used most by pros: the top Nikons and the Canons, for instance.
Now that we've announced Aperture, it's opened the way for us to have discussions with camera vendors and ask to be told of future development. There's intellectual property associated with way they do things. It's difficult to make it a lot of easier for the user.
TS: So Apple's Raw parsers are built into the OS, and that's where Aperture gets the information to generate previews for Raw images?
JS: Let's say you have a Canon 20D. If you took a Raw file from it today and double-clicked, the Mac opens the file in Preview. You can see the Raw file, but you can't do anything to it. There are no tools in Preview to take advantage of what you can do with that Raw file.
The benefit of Raw is that you can reprocess. In Aperture, we've given you the decoder to open the file and the tools to take advantage of it.
Let me also draw the distinction between Aperture and iPhoto. You can see a Raw image in iPhoto, but let's say you make an adjustment to the file, like changing contrast. In iPhoto, you now have an 8-bit JPEG. You've said goodbye to Raw.
So the iPhoto choices are that you work in the world of JPEG, or you go back to Raw and lose all the adjustments you've done in iPhoto. It's a binary decision.
Aperture never makes that conversion from Raw to JPEG. You crop it, you throw away pixels, and the original Raw image is
Below is a link to an interview with Apple Aperture Product Manager Joe Schorr, which I read over a month ago, and it answers most of your questions (and most of the other Slashdot readers questions):
CreativePro.com
Oh, give it a rest. Are you sure it isn't they are simply acting far more intelligent than you think you are? Everything tries to make everyone else out to be equal when that is absolutely not the case. Not everyone is brilliant, sorry to break it to you. If these people are smarter than %99.999 of the Earth's population, then they have every right in the world to act as arrogant as they wish. Well adjusted is a joke, it is simply a pigeonhole term used to try and make everyone who does not act like everyone else out to have some kind of problem.
Oh, give it a rest. Are you sure it isn't they are simply acting far more intelligent than you think you are? Everything tries to make everyone else out to be equal when that is absolutely not the case. Not everyone is brilliant, sorry to break it to you. If these people are smarter than %99.999 of the Earth's population, then they have every right in the world to act as arrogant as they wish. Well adjusted is a joke, it is simply a pigeonhole term used to try and make everyone who does not act like everyone else out to have some kind of problem.
LOL
PS - And if it turns out that if aliens are eventually found and they admit to having created life on our planet, that will be perfectly fine. And if, after rigorous scientific analysis, that conclusion is found to be true then it would answer some of the greatest mysteries of mankind. But, to hide behind the term Intelligent Design as if it is not defined in context in society as being strictly is use by the religious, is nothing but a facade. Until the day that the aliens land and tell us that they created life on our planet, or we discover any other scientfic reason, Intelligent Design is no more scientifically disprovable, repeatable, or predictable than any other no basis fantasy you want to come up with.
The fact is that Intelligent Design is religious in origin and illogical in its entirety. You do not explore Intelligent Design, because Intelligent Design = Religion = Fantasy. You explore reality and the tool for that is Science.
Windows and OS X don't even compete with the features I use a lot, such as working with remote servers
Like what exactly? Everything I have used and needed with OS X 10.3 and now 10.4 has worked absolutely flawlessly. I'll repeat, flawlessly. That has included SSH/Telnet/FTP, Cisco VPN, Remote Desktop, Windows Virtual/Web Drives (shared over the internet/WAN), File/Printer Sharing in a Windows Domain, and much more. Everything I have setup in Linux to match the ease of use of an Apple OS X machine in a networked environment has proven to be a huge pain in the ass.
What exactly on Linux makes its networking ease and power so much better than Apple OS X? If you say kioslaves/gfvs you've got to be kidding.
Exactly. I call this entire article and study complete bullshit. Another bad example of a bad study correlating unrelated or vaguely related data to draw a completely meaningless conclusion. Sure, buddy, all 5+ billion people in the world fall into two categories and only the introverts are the mentally superior ones. Give me a break.
There are hundreds, if not more, factors involved in someone's intellectual being. What about the brilliant mind who is an introvert when alone but loves to share and teach and enjoys interacting socially with people who share their common interests? Is this person worse off intellectually than someone who sits by themselves and shares with no one or has trouble sharing at all? What about people who are naturally born speakers or great with dealing with people in general but are also exceptional thinkers? What does the study have to say about those people? What about people who are brilliant but simply enjoy the company of others and feel good after physical activity?
I could go on, but the study is terminally flawed and once again draws false conclusions from bad data. It would be nice to have the link to send the authors of the study a note about their research, because all TOO often research is published and there is no way to say "Hey, that is a complete bunch of bullshit. Who peer reviewed this information?" Too often people take these kinds of studies as the truth without even thinking critically and analytically about the data and the conclusions. Which really makes you wonder about the introverts on Slashdot, since I have only seen a handful of people even question this data. Everyone else just seems to like it because it strokes their ego somehow.
Whatever kid.
You and the rest of the idiots should run along and play now.
You have it backwards. I will fix your original post for you:
"I will not never pay $100/hour for a C++ semi-expert programmer, but $200/hour for a Java expert programmer!)"
When you grow up kid, it would be best to lose your ignorance.
You are a complete moron.
And learn to spell.
Startup time should not be an issue any more with properly written programs using JDK 1.5 and up thanks to technologies such as Class Data Sharing. Thanks to Apple for pioneering this technology. There are many, many other examples and documentation on Sun's website explaining how to properly code Java programs to optimize their startup execution, but CDS is a technology aimed directly at assisting startup times of Java programs.
Class Data Sharing
Sun
IBM
Apple
Java is exactly as other people say it is, fast and scalable, when written by professional Java programmers in a professional development environment. Judging Java by some no name piece of code is not exactly an intelligent judgement call.
"What Sun really needs to do is market Java better as a game development platform."
Exactly.
Java does not earn its reputation, bad programming and bad programming practices give it a bad reputation, with those outside of the professional programming world.
As a Senior Software Engineer with over 8 years of Java programming experience, I can tell you that the real problem is that %99 of programmers do not know how to properly program Java or OOPL's in general. The other %1 do not put the time into making their Java programs professional grade. You can read Sun's JDK documentation and examples showing how Java -should- be programmed from an OOP perspective and how Java is very strict in its interpretation and usage. You can read Sun's documentation and example code showing how to optimize every aspect of a Java program, especially very large highly scaled applications. But, what is happening is that without even reading the Java documentation, bad C/C++ programmers are trying out Java, using bad C/C++ code practices and understanding, and applying them directly to Java. Sure, the bad Java code will compile and run, but will run very poorly. Then Java is blamed and the programmers go back to programming bad C/C++ code without even looking into what the problem may have been to begin with. And this does not even begin to cover people who are trying to transfer over from programming VB.
Now that C# is becoming more popular, which is very close in syntax and concept as Java, along with better Java IDE's, optimizers, programming and testing tools, excellent new JDK features and additions (1.5 is excellent and 1.6 looks to be even more exciting), and excellent JVM's for all supported platforms hopefully programmers will become more educated in programming Java and OOPL's in general.
I have personally, along with my programming team, written many J2SE and J2EE applications which are extremely fast, extremely stable, and extremely scalable. I can only think of a handful of applications which might be better written in any language -except- Java.
To add to what one of the parent posters said, Java bashers/haters are those who have no real experience with the language in a corporate or production environment, especially an environment run by a group of professional and experienced Java programmers. Most people's experiences with Java was back in the 1.0 days and have no idea how far Java has come to reach 1.5 and how many more exciting features are coming in 1.6. On the home computer side of things, Azuerus is nice, I use it myself but it is not the best Java code ever written. Nor has most of the Java code I have seen in the open source programs I have checked out in recent years.
Wow, talk about Intro to Philosophy 101. Not the brightest bulb in the box, are you?
Arguing words and meanings instead of the reality which they represent is pointless. Possession and ownership of something, whether it is just a mental construct of our existence, is a basic part of life for all higher level organisms. For all purposes it is just as real as living and breathing. Ever seen a beer scratching a tree or a dog peeing on a fire hydrant? Ever observe that socialism fails?
All parts of higher level existence such as competition, possession, ownership, value, etc. are as real as the terms used to represent them. It is all part of existence which is part of what makes our universe such an interesting place.
Sure kid.
Your post wreaks of:
1) I do not own an Apple dual 2GHz G5
2) I only play video games on my computer
When you have some real performance information, using important applications, then come back here and try posting something intelligent.
Let me clarify one point:
What I meant by 4GHz AMD64 was AMD64 4000+ (2.4GHz with 1MB L2 Cache).
Let me clarify one point:
What I meant by 4GZ AMD64 was AMD64 4000+ (2.4Ghz with 1MB L2 Cache).
"Anyone with half a brain would invest in a desktop where replacing components is cheaper. Why pay a premium for a cpu that only works in a laptop where something as simple as swapping an HD can take a few days if not weeks and possibly more money than just buying the drive..."
Bull shit. I sold my desktop computer and bought a laptop for everything. I saved a ton of office space and I did not have to double my computing investment to get both worlds of processing power and portability. Since I do not play computer games on my computer, there was no reason in the world for me to not just buy an AMD64 laptop. Now, my development environment is both powerful and portable without taking up unneccesary space. Plus, with wireless networking, I can work anywhere in the house at any time or anywhere with wireless. And whenever I need to bring my development environment with me, I just pack up my laptop and I can go. Two things I could never do with the desktop computer. And what components are you talking about? The 4Ghz AMD64? The 100GB HDD? The 2GB of RAM? The 12 cell Lithium battery? Built-in 6-in-1 media card reader? What exactly am I so desperately missing out on that I will need to upgrade in the future at such a huge cost? I do not play games on my computer, so the video card is going to be good for many years to come. And the HDD size is perfectly fine since all of my big files are on external Firewire 800 HDD's anyways.
Your post is more bullshit from another Slashdot user who has never used his computer for anything except playing video games and surfing the internet.
You would be amazed at the difference it makes by just upgrading the video card. Too bad laptop video cards are not upgradable.
Uh huh, sure buddy. Let's take a look at what you said again... "
Its cool and all, and it seems to be fast enough to run quark, photoshop, illustrator, flash, and dreamweaver on my machine." And what kind of work do you do that requires more processing power than that? If you are doing huge photograph rendering and editing, I could see wanting a more powerful PowerPC machine, such as a G5. Heavy graphical or video work would require a much more powerful video card. But, by the sounds of your post, I think you either do not own an Apple laptop or do nothing more than surf the internet with it, click on a few items, count the time it takes for a few various programs to startup and try to make a statement about the performance of your Powerbook. Typical Slashdot garbage.
Nice post, but like most posts the poster has no real clue what he is posting about.
Fact: My wife and I own a Honda Insight
Fact: NiMH is recylcable and the metals are highly valuable
Fact: We have ~127,000 miles and a %100 perfect battery. Nationwide, the Honda Insight owners registry has most batteries being worked on after 200,000 miles. With zero non-maintenance repairs in the past ~127,000 miles, battery replacement is not a major financial consideration.
Too bad you got rated so high for such a clearly unintelligent post. My wife and I own a Honda Insight. We love driving it and love the fuel savings we achieve (64mpg lifetime average over ~127,000 miles). We even bought it used and now save enough in gas over our old car that we use the gas savings to pay for our Honda Insight loan and use our now none existant loan payment for fun money. Another HUGE point the linked article missed.
BUT, to get to your point, a couple of weeks ago my wife and I found this beautiful sleigh bed made by the Amish Store. Our current bed is in serious need to be replaced. Now, with no delivery available from the store, how in the hell were we going to get the bed home? It sure as hell wasn't going to be in the Honda Insight. So, I had to call my brother who has a large Chevy pickup truck to come to the store, pick up the bed and matresses, and help me move them to my place. On a weekend.
If there were no more cars, how would that be accomplished? Diesel delivery service? You seriously need to think about what the impacts of a vehicleless society would be before you post.